According to him, the project filing session started in September 2014 and will end in February 2015, and winning the financing for the construction of the multimodal platform in Galati is almost a certainty.

The construction works will take 36 months, the project being a partnership between the port of Galati represented by the Danube Maritime Ports Administration (APDM) as state-owned applicant, private companies Port Bazinul Nou Galati and Metaltrade Galati, and Germany’s Duisburg port. The terminal will ensure the transport of merchandise on the Rhine-Danube-Asia route. Duisburg is the biggest inland waterway port in the world, registering a transit of over four million shipping containers.

85 per cent of the project’s total budget consists of European non-reimbursable funds, the remaining 15 per cent representing the local contribution. Of the latter, 60 per cent consists of the contribution of private partners – Port Bazinul Nou and Metaltrade – and 40 per cent of the Romanian state’s contribution through APDM Galati.

According to Corneliu Gavaneanu, director of SC Port Bazinul Nou, on completion the multimodal platform will be able to handle 300,000 shipping containers, the equivalent of 5-6 million tons per year, against the backdrop in which the maximum level of traffic through the Bazinul Nou port stood at 1 million tons at a time when the Arcelor Mittal Galati steel plant was at maximum production capacity. (source: nineoclock.ro)