Kenya Ports Authority Managing Director Catherine Mturi-Wairi [Photo: the-star.co.ke]
Tendering is underway for the expansion of the Kipevu Oil Terminal that will upgrade the facility to handle four ships at a time, up from the current one ship.
Kenya Ports Authority Managing Director Catherine Mturi-Wairi says underground pipes to the Kenya Pipeline Company facilities will be introduced during the expansion to reduce the time taken to offload petroleum products and getting them to their destination.
Kenyans have had to shoulder costs as a result of delays in offloading cargo from ships bringing in petroleum products.
This has been blamed on low capacity at the Kipevu Oil Terminal that handles ships bringing in petroleum products.
This prompted the Kenya Ports Authority to moot plans to expand the facility to improve efficiency at the terminal.
Currently, the process is at the tendering stage. The Kenya Ports Authority has taken over the management of the Kisumu Pier that has port facilities in Kisumu, Homa Bay, Mbita and Luanda K’Otieno from Kenya Railways Corporation.
KPA plans to revamp the facilities to rejuvenate shipping services especially for goods destined for Tanzania, Uganda as well as Islands on Lake Victoria.
The expansion of port services is hinged on the expected increase in volumes powered by the launch of commercial operations of freight services on the Standard Gauge Railway.
Going forward, KPA targets to stabilize the cargo dwell time at the Port of Mombasa currently at 4.2 days as well as the ship turnaround time now at 2.9 days.
During the first nine months of this year, Uganda accounted for 80 percent of Transit cargo through the Port of Mombasa.