South Korea has unveiled its plan to invest USD $35.2 billion by 2040 to enhance the country’s cargo-handling capacity at twelve ports across the country, according to national outlet Yonhap News.
According to the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries, the investment aims to increase the port sector handling capacity to 1.85 billion tons per year in 2040 from 1.32 billion tons in 2017.
The plan involves a capital injection of USD $13 billion from the government and $22.2 billion from the private sector.
Key to the initiative will be the transformation of the Port of Busan into a mega port in order to make it capable of accommodating a larger number of 25,000-TEU vessels.
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“We will make Busan Port the world’s third largest port by 2040,” Moon Seong-hyeok, minister of oceans and fisheries, told to local media.
The port ranked as the sixth largest port in the world in 2018 offering a handling capacity of 21.66 million TEUs behind the Asian cities of Shanghai, Singapore, Ningbo, Shenzhen and Guangzhou.
The port, located at the mouth of the Naktong River, is the largest transhipment port in north-east Asia with 26.8km of quay wall that allow its terminals to berth approximately 169 vessels simultaneously and handle cargo of 91 million tons per annum.
PTI recently reported on the Busan Port Authority (BPA) plan to establish a blockchain-based inter-terminal transportation (ITT) system to enhance its ITT flow.
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