Posted on June 30, 2021
BUENOS AIRES, June 29 (Reuters) – Argentina will offer a one-year contract to maintain the dredging of the Parana River, the country’s key grains export superhighway, while the government prepares a longer concession, Transport Minister Alexis Guerrera said on Tuesday.
The country’s most important logistics system has been managed for 25 years by Belgian dredger Jan de Nul. The company is dredging the river under a 90-day contract it was awarded in April, and is expected to bid for the upcoming concessions.
Argentina is the world’s No. 3 corn exporter and top supplier of soymeal livestock feed, used to fatten hogs and poultry from Europe to Southeast Asia. About 80% of the country’s grains exports flow down the Parana from the Pampas farm belt to the shipping lanes of the Atlantic.
There is a decree awaiting the signature of President Alberto Fernandez that “will allow us to launch a tender for 12 months and be headed by the General Port Administration,” Guerrera told radio station El Destape.
The objective of the one-year tender is “to give us enough time to prepare the long tender,” said Guerrera. Under the one-year concession, it will be the state, rather than the dredging company itself, that will charge the fees that cargo ships pay to use the waterway. Until now the company has charged the fee.
The Parana River has made the South American grains powerhouse one of the world’s most efficient food exporters. Huge cargo ships can be loaded directly at Rosario and avoid the inefficient barges and trucking that bog down shipping in rival exporters Brazil and the United States.
The river at Rosario is currently dredged to about 34 feet deep. Industry leaders want the next contract to provide for a deeper and wider shipping channel to improve navigability.
(Reporting by Maximilian Heath and Hugh Bronstein; Editing by Stephen Coates)
