South Africa’s president outlines vision to restore Durban as Africa’s largest boxport

The South African president has outlined plans to restore Durban’s position as Africa’s largest container port.

Cyril Ramaphosa has unveiled a R100bn ($7bn) blueprint to expand capacity in Durban from 2.9m teu to 11m teu over the coming decade.

The plans seek private investment to work alongside state-run port operator Transnet with significant dredging around key channels to allow larger ships to call. Current berths would be upgraded, while a new container terminal is also to be built at Point Precinct, an area of the city that is undergoing a massive makeover at the moment.

“There is still much work to be done to position Durban as a world-class port and as a hub port for the Southern Hemisphere,” Ramaphosa conceded while outlining his vision for the revamped port, which also calls for its car carrying capacity to increase by two-thirds.

Durban was Africa’s busiest container port for decades but has now slipped into third place behind Tangiers in Morocco and Port Said in Egypt.