Bulk grain terminal starts extension

The Nansha Bulk Grain Terminal of Guangzhou Port, with an investment of 1.77 billion yuan ($248.25 million), announced on Sept 20 that it will start construction of a site extension.

A kick-off meeting of the Nansha Bulk Grain Terminal Extension Project of the Guangzhou Port begins at the construction site. [Photo/gznsnews.com.cn]

Two 100,000-ton generic berths, a 40,000-ton sundry goods berth and five 5,000-ton barge berths have been put on the construction schedule with an expected commissioning date in March of 2022.

The to-be-built berths will mainly receive and unload grains, steel, timber and mechanical equipment.

The completed terminal will have nine grain and generic berths as well as ten barge berths in total, and will become a large deepwater harbor with an annual throughput capacity of 36 million tons occupying 3.6-kilometers of port shoreline.

A kick-off meeting of the Nansha Bulk Grain Terminal Extension Project of the Guangzhou Port begins at the construction site. [Photo/gznsnews.com.cn]

Guangzhou Port now has Xinsha and Xingang terminals in its east and Nansha bulk grain terminal in its west, supplying grain to the whole of South China.

Guangdong Province’s food supply mainly relies on imports from other provinces and overseas, especially since the gap between its grain supply and demand has further expanded in recent years.

It consumes 54 million tons of grain with a year-on-year growth of 3.1 percent this year, while the imported food cargo volume soared to 41 million tons.

The province’s water-way grain throughput was about 33 million tons in 2018, 17.6 million of which --nearly half --was achieved by Guangzhou Port, according to official web data from the Grain Administration of Guangdong Province.

“The extension project will improve the situation when the Nansha bulk grain terminal operations are overloaded,” said a project leader from China Railway Guangzhou Engineering Group Co, Ltd.