Portugal’s Prime Minister today said that Portugal has the potential to grow its ports business due to the country's privileged location at the western gateway to Europe.
António Costa spoke at the ‘Strategy for the Increase of Port Competitiveness’ conference which took place in the booming port of Sines on Monday, December 19th.
The prime minister said that "Portugal has potential for growth in its ports activity," noting that the Portuguese faces west on the Atlantic trade route and is betting on big business from China in the coming decades.
"International trade based on shipping has a favorable scenario and Portugal has a privileged position. We are internationally favoured because, as we are members of the Ibero-American community, we cannot ignore a fundamental change that resulted from the expansion of the Panama Canal, which will boost routes between the Pacific and the Atlantic,"António Costa said.
The minister of the sea, Ana Paula Vitorino, presented the Government's strategy to increase the competitiveness of Portuguese ports, announced a set of actions that involve new investments and the creation of 12,000 new jobs.
"We have a very strong target: to create 12,000 new jobs by 2030," said Vitorino, adding that the Government intends also to attract more national and international investment and to maximise private and community investment.
"We have planned, over the next decade, to capture investment in the order of €2.5 billion,” added the minister who says the ports business is part of Portugal’s National Reform Plan.
"We want Portuguese ports to be a fundamental hub for the internationalisation of the Portuguese economy, to create value through the acquisition of more goods, new investments to support the development of new technological development platforms linked to research, innovation, science, and technology, mainly related to the sectors of oceanic renewable energies, mineral and energy resources, the environment, submarine robotics, shipbuilding and aquaculture contributing to the achievement of a sustainable system from the economic, financial, social and environmental point of view," said Vitorino.
"Our ambition is to constitute Portugal as an important logistics hub in Europe and to boost ports as a launching pad for other activities related to the economy of the sea," continued the minister who was not pushed on her desire to develop “mineral and energy resources,” leaving question marks in the air as to the future of the offshore oil and gas extraction concessions currently in play and the plan to vacuum the seabed in the search for mineral resources, to the detriment of marine life.
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