The congress was held under the patronage of Jabara Bin Al Suraiseri, Saudi Arabian Minister of Transport and Chairman of Saudi Ports Authority, who launched the event to address the country’s exponential growth in maritime trade, promote internal and foreign direct investment, as well as support the creation of job opportunities for Saudi nationals.
Capt. Mohamed Juma Al Shamisi, CEO, ADPC, was one of the high profile speakers of the two-day conference that also provided a forum to discuss current developments in the regional maritime industry, especially the changing nature of global trade from west to east.
“Our countries are ideally located in the heart of future maritime trade and have the resources, means and know-how to be at the forefront of progress. Alongside our valuable collaborations, we now have to work towards developing a GCC union to further strengthen our bonds and positions as global maritime hubs”, Al Shamisi explained and continued:
“One crucial step in the development of the region’s maritime industry is the investment in state-of-the-art port infrastructure to cater for the anticipated growth and needs of today’s and tomorrow’s maritime industry and the customer requirements moving forward”, Al Shamisi added.
ADPC’s prime example of state-of-the-art port infrastructure is Khalifa Port. As the first semi-automated container port in the region, Khalifa Port is now in its first development phase and can handle an annual capacity of 2 million TEUs and 12 million tons of general cargo. When all development phases are completed, the port is expected to handle 15 million TEUs and 35 million tons of general cargo per year.
Most recently, Khalifa Port was ranked number five for port productivity in the Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) region by the Journal of Commerce (JOC), one of the most prestigious magazines on global trade topics published in the Unites States.