TANGER MED A new Antwerp IN NORTH AFRICA

At the other end of the Mediterranean is another remarkable example of a government using civil engineering as a lever to move an entire economy, in this case that of the north Moroccan region, which contains most of the country’s industry and population.

The port in question is the Tanger–Mediterranean terminal, directly opposite Gibraltar, which opened for business in July 2007 with a design capacity of 2.8 million teu. By 2014 the volume of containers had already reached 3 million, putting it equal to Africa’s biggest, busiest and best facility at Durban in South Africa. Growth fell back 3% in 2015 – unsurprisingly, given the 10% fall in global merchandise trade in that year – but it was clear to the government of Morocco and the Tanger Med Port Authority that the longer-term prospects justified an expansion to as many as 9 million teu. This is now under way, and when it is complete, it will mean that a port that didn’t exist 10 years ago has become the equal of Antwerp.

The growth potential of a container terminal lies in its location relative to trade flows. Here Tanger–Med is at even more of an advantage than the Suez terminals, being 10 days sailing from the New York, three from Rotterdam and 20 from Shanghai. What’s more, it is on the “line of zero deviation” for ships on the east–west trade run through Gibraltar, which includes 20% of the world’s maritime traffic. In other words, ships can call there without diverting from their course, and unload boxes for transhipment by road, rail or feeder ship. This is set fair to make Tanger–Med the largest port in the Mediterranean. And together with its state-of-the-art equipment, low charges and four special economic zones, it looks likely to become a shining example of infrastructure-led development for the whole of Africa.

As is usually the case with shining examples, surrounding countries are hoping to follow suit. The following is a tour around the southern shores of the Mediterranean, where some remarkable projects are

Morocco is the site of the most ambitious terminal expansion plan anywhere in Africa: the €825m Tanger–Med II. This will add a separate, larger, harbour to the western edge of Tanger–Med I, as well as two container terminals with the capacity to handle 5 million teu. There is scope for additional expansions after the first phase is complete in 2019, which would bring the combined capacity of the ports up to 9 million teu.

The new port will be run by local company Marsa Maroc and APM Terminals (APMT), a company based in the Netherlands but owned by Danish shipper Maersk. The work is being carried out on a design-and-build basis by the same consortium that built Med I, led by Bouygues Travaux Publics and including Besix of Belgium, Saipem of Italy and Somagec and Bymaro of Morocco.

The work includes the construction of a 4.4km of breakwaters, a 1.6km quay for terminal 3 and a 1.2km quay for terminal 4.

Tanger–Med is ideally placed to provide unloading points for the 100,000 ships a year that pass through the Straits of Gibraltar, and to gain the greatest profit from this flow it has installed the specialised cranage required to reach into the latest Ultra Large Container Ships, which cram as many as 20,000 containers into their 59m beam.

Staying with the subject of loading and unloading, another feature that Tanger–Med II will offer to shippers is the use of the latest 52m-high ship-to-shore remote controlled cranes: 12 have been ordered from Shanghai’s ZPMC, and will be delivered at the end of this year. They will be supplemented by 32 automated rail-mounted gantry cranes from Austrian engineer Künz. The aim of this state-of-the-art equipment is to offer the fastest, most cost-effective service, which is important in Tanger–Med’s battle with Algeciras (4.5 million teu), on the other side of the straits, and will become even more so in the coming years as rival ports go into business along the North African coast.

Tanger–Med is also a demonstration of the ability of container terminals to form the nucleus of large industrial complexes. The four export-orientated free trade zones around this one have experienced a rapid influx of investment, particularly in the automotive, aeronautics and textile sectors: one anchor tenant is Renault, which is building the largest car factory in Africa, with a capacity to produce 340,000 vehicles a year, and in March 2017 Chinese aerospace company Haite announced plans to build a $10bn industrial and technology city.

Altogether, the economic zones in place now provide manufacturing sites for 700 companies over 1,200ha, and generate revenue of about €5bn a year.