US$100 million allocated for SVG port development

The relocation and modernization of the Kingstown Port is estimated to cost approximately US$100 million, says Minister of Economic Planning, Sustainable Development, Industry, Information and Labour Camillo Gonsalves.

At a press briefing on Tuesday at the Cabinet room, Gonsalves assured reporters that funds for the project have already been allocated, naming the United Kingdom government and the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB) as major contributors in this effort.{{more}}

“The government and people of the United Kingdom, through an infrastructure development fund that they have provided to some countries in the Caribbean, is going to be a major contributor to this effort on the new port,” said Gonsalves.

“The United Kingdom to that effort, that hundred million dollar effort… is going to provide a grant of US$40 million, again that number may change, give or take, because they giving us the money in pounds and the exchange rate will vary sometimes, but it’s in the neighbourhood of $40 million US dollars.”

Gonsalves said an additional US$40 million will come from the CDB, while the remaining US$20 million will come from the World Bank.

He added, “We had a number discussions to solidify these broad numbers, and we’ll have opportunity to go into greater detail, but I don’t know if this is the appropriate time for us to be talking about decimal places and all the rest of it.”

“But in broad terms, that is how that money is coming for the port; the British money is ready; they have it on hand, it’s ready to be spent and we look forward to finalizing some of those arrangements in the coming weeks and months,” said Gonsalves.

He said the port facility in SVG has gone past its “sell-buy date; it is past its expiration date and as much effort as we have placed into improving our airport facilities, there’s significant work that we have to do in our sea port facilities to make sure that our ability to handle cargo and process cargo in and out of St Vincent and the Grenadines is markedly improved.”

The minister disclosed that the port will be moved from its current location, which would “free up” a lot of real estate for further development in Kingstown.

“We are going to modernize the port significantly, so that it can deal with the new realities of moving cargo by sea; ships are larger now; you get more things on one ship, things are increasingly computerized and the efficiency of the port is directly tied to our efficiency in being an exporting nation and also in collecting revenue,” he added.(AS)