Singapore's PSA International has won a deal to build a container port project in Vietnam's southern province of Vung Tau, the port operator said. It is PSA's first project in Vietnam and gives the Singapore port operator, wholly owned by state-linked investment firm Temasek Holdings, a foothold in the fast growing Southeast Asian economy which expanded over 8% in 2006.
The Vung Tau port will be developed by SP-PSA International Port Co. Ltd, a joint venture between Saigon Port and PSA Vietnam, a wholly-owned unit of the Singapore port operator, it said in a statement.
The container port will be built in two phases, with a first section to be operational in 2009. When both are completed, it should be capable of handling two million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) annually.
PSA's Singapore and foreign terminals handled record container volumes of 51.29 million TEUs in 2006, up 18.6% over the previous year.
PSA is one of the world's top port operators with 20 port facilities in 11 countries in Asia and Europe.
Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2007
