East Timor opens new port in largest ever single foreign investment
East Timor inaugurated a new deepwater port on Wednesday operated by a French conglomerate, in the largest ever single foreign investment on an infrastructure project in Southeast Asia’s youngest country.
The $490 million port at Tibar Bay near the capital Dili is expected to expand trade for East Timor, one of the poorest countries in the region. “It was necessary for East Timor to be connected to the main shipping lines in Asia,” French transport giant Bollore’s director of ports Olivier de Noray said.
The port will be able to receive ships of more than 8,000 containers, he said, and vessels sailing from Singapore through the Indonesian archipelago to Australia will be able to call there.
East Timor, which gained independence from Indonesian occupation in 2002, already has a port in Dili but it is not deep enough to accommodate large container ships.
The new project, which took four years to complete, is being operated under a 30-year publicprivate partnership agreement.