According to official media reported from the island, the terminal will begin operations with a first phase in January 2014.
The news published today in the Official Gazette of Cuba of a new decree regulating Mariel area and opens the door to foreign investment in the sectors of storage, exports and imports with contracts up to 50 years (renewable), brings us closer to the idea that in large measure the economic development of the island may have on this new port, one of its greatest strengths.
This project started in 2010 developed by a joint venture between Odebrecht Group, the largest engineering and Construction Company in Brazil, and the investor Cuban Mariel Comprehensive Development Zone to build a special development area of about 465 square kilometers.
Initially have a 700 meter long dock (765 yards anchor) that allows it to receive up two large merchant ships. The project area includes containers, warehouses, cold storage, fuel supply, food distribution and other shipping services.
Cuba aims to become a regional logistics center of goods. In the future it may receive large vessels with goods for consumption in Cuba and transshipment to other ports in the Caribbean and America. Mariel is a port north of Cuba and makes it ideal for load transfer to the United States when this lift its trade embargo on the island
It is predicted to replace the Havana harbor, which it will close nearly every port and industrial operations, including thermal power plant and refinery, to become a tourist port and used primarily by passengers.
According to researcher Pedro Monreal in his text Postpanamax era: an opportunity for Cuba?, With the construction of the new port “Cuba could be close to a favorable situation to renew its development strategy and to reconfigure its international diplomacy. In fact, what appears to be approaching a kind of rare opportunity, of the kind that takes over a century to appear. This would be what could be termed as the Postpanamax era, ie the eventual transformation that important segments of international trade and global manufacturing organization would experience with the entry into operation of the new Panama Canal, scheduled for 2015, with effects that are predicted particularly intense in the geographical proximity to Cuba “.
He adds, “one might think that is exaggerated, but part of a process able to cut the cost of each of the 12 million containers that arrive at the four largest ports on the East Coast of the United States, with the effect that this would have on the price of consumer products in the world’s largest market, in reducing input costs of global production chains that originate in Asia, and in improving the profits of thousands of companies, is not a minor issue. Surely that would be more relevant to the functioning of the global economy to host tourists, operate mines, or even produce medicines on a small island in the Caribbean. “
