Transform the Indonesian port of Belawan, in North Sumatra, into a hub for traffic handled in the Strait of Malacca.
It is with this in mind that Dubai terminal operator Dp World and the Indonesian Investment Authority recently signed a $7.5 billion agreement under which they intend to expand the annual capacity of the port’s container terminal from the current 600,000 TEUs to 1.4 million TEUs.
Quite an achievement if you consider that Indonesia’s main port, Tanjung Priok in Jakarta, handles an average of just under 7 million TEUs a year.
At present, Belawan’s container terminal only acts as a feeder facility for the region’s larger ports such as Singapore, Tanjung Pelepas and Klang.