Vietnam requires $13-bln seaport infrastructure investment by 2030

Vietnam needs to invest $13 billion in seaport infrastructure by 2030 to improve the handling of container goods from the current 24 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEU) a year to 30-40 million.

About 90% of the capital should be mobilized from the private sector, Le Cong Minh, chairman of Vietnam Port Association (VPA), added in a speech at the VPA's annual meeting in Danang city Thursday.

The amount of goods transferred via seaports in Vietnam reached 496 million tons in the first eight months of this year, up 3% year-on-year, according to a Ministry of Transport report. The August figure reached 62 million tons, of which container goods was 2.13 million TEUs.

Regarding inland waterways, 242.5 million tons of goods were transported in the period.

Vietnam currently operates 34 seaports, excluding ones particularly serving oil-gas activities. Per the seaport planning 2021-2030, with vision to 2050, the seaport network is set to transport 1.14-1.42 billion tons of goods a year, of which container goods is 38-47 million TEUs.

The planning, which was approved last September, aims to increase the total number of seaports to 36, featuring Haiphong and Ba Ria-Vung Tau seaports as two special cases.

The seaport sector in Vietnam will continue its stable growth, Mirae Asset Vietnam said in a report in August. The brokerage attributed the growth to the country’s strong export-import activities, attraction of foreign direct investment into the manufacturing and processing sector, and stable production in the post-Covid-19 recovery period.

It predicted the total transported goods via seaports could reach 710 million tons this year.

The firm said the possible global economic slowdown is the main risk for the seaport sector, partly due to the U.S Federal Reserve’s tightening monetary policies, higher energy prices resulting from the Ukraine-Russia conflict, and China’s continuation of its "zero-Covid" policy.

Most recently, Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC), the second largest container ship firm in the world, proposed building a “mega” seaport in Can Gio district, Ho Chi Minh City.

The project, with a proposed investment of $6 billion, could receive the world’s biggest container ship of 24,000 TEUs and have a capacity of 10-15 million TEUs a year. Earlier this week, local authorities selected Portcoast Consultant Corporation to conduct a pre-feasibility study for the project.