The North Butterworth Container Terminal (NBCT) registered some 13% increase in the volume of cargo it handled in October.
NBCT handled 94,570 twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) in October, compared with 83,103 TEUs in September.
Penang Port Sdn Bhd general manager Obaid Mansor told StarBiz that the higher cargo volume was driven by goods from southern Thailand, rise in local businesses’ imports and exports, and an increase in the volume of empty containers from India and the Middle-East.
“We are confident of achieving our target of 930,000 TEUs by the year-end, matching the volume of cargo handled in 2008,” he said.
On the expansion of NBCT, he said the work to extend the 900m berth to 1,500m would be completed a year earlier.
“The original schedule for completion was October 2011. We have finished adding 400m to the berth,” he said.
He also said NBCT had already received four of the seven post-Panamax gantry cranes that it had ordered. “The other three cranes will arrive in the first week of December. Each crane costs RM25mil,” he said.
By: The Star Online
