ICTSI signs deal for 2nd Subic container yard

MANILA, Philippines - Global port operator International Container Terminal Services Inc. (ICTSI) has signed a 25-year contract with the Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority (SBMA) to develop and operate the New Container Terminal 2 (NCT-2) at Cubi Point, in Subic Bay.

 ICTSI was the sole qualified bidder for the NCT-2, the second phase of the $215 million Subic port modernization project co-funded by the Japanese government through the Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC).

NCT-2 is being positioned as a transshipment hub for shipping lines and has an annual cargo-handling capacity of 300,000 (twenty-foot equivalent units) TEUs, which can be expanded to 600,000 TEUs.

The project has the potential of generating annual revenues of $6 million, including wharfage fees.

The SBMA expects NCT-2 to further boost its break-bulk business that has been growing by about 40 percent annually in the past three years prior to the global financial crisis in 2009. The government has invested $80 million in NCT-2.

NCT-2 has 14 hectares of newly-constructed container yard, a 280-meter long newly-constructed wharf, two units of 53-ton quay gantry cranes, as well as buildings, equipment and utilities within the area.

The Subic port has remained underutilized with volume of between 60,000 to 70,000 TEUs because cargoes from the Central Luzon are still being shipped through the Manila ports.

The completion of the two port terminals is expected to boost Subic’s bid to become a major player in the containerized and non-containerized cargo handling business in the entire Asia-Pacific region.

ICTSI, its subsidiaries and associated companies, own or operate a total of 22 terminal facilities, six in the Philippines and one each in China, Ecuador, Poland, Brazil, Madagascar, Syria, Georgia, Brunei, Indonesia, Japan, India, Colombia, Argentina, Croatia, Mexico and the United States of which four (the terminals in India, Colombia, Argentina and Mexico) are currently under construction.