The vice president of the National Port Administration of Uruguay (ANP), Juan José Domínguez, participated on Wednesday (20.2.2019) in a meeting with representatives of the Port Services Administration of Bolivia (ASP-B), members of a technical mission that visited the ports of Fray Bentos and Nueva Palmira. The official stated that in Uruguayan ports the volume of Bolivian cargo could exceed that of Paraguayan cargo.
River transit through the Paraguay-Paraná waterway can be a very economical vehicle for the departure of Bolivian cargo”, Dominguez said at the port of Nueva Palmira.
The day before, the technical mission, made up of the director of operations of that institution, Diego Arce, and the administrator of that department in the Chilean port of Arica, Cristian Jallaza, joined by the new ambassador of that country in Uruguay, René Orellana Helkyer, held a meeting with the board of directors of the ANP in Montevideo.
The visiting delegation and ANP authorities met with private operators (shipping companies, maritime agencies and customs agents), some of whom held individual meetings with visitors at the end of the day.
“Here ships can take up to 30.000 tons of cargo (from the highland country)”, Dominguez said. The volume of Bolivian cargo from the ports of Jennefer, Aguirre or Gravetal that is handled in the Uruguayan ports of Fray Bentos, Nueva Palmira and Montevideo may exceed that from Paraguay, he added.
""The arrival of barges to Fray Bentos and Nueva Palmira and the transfer of cargo to ocean vessels or the completion of the cargo in Montevideo is very important for Bolivia," He highlighted that cement, iron structures, soybeans and fertilizers could be some of the goods that leave through national port terminals.
Now, Bolivian representatives will "analyze the operational advantages" regarding the port of Arica, Chile, which they have historically used for the export of their foreign trade. Conversely, Domínguez said that he expects that the wind turbines that the country of the highlands uses in the change of its energy matrix will continue to enter through Fray Bentos.
The official recalled that the visit is part of the operational agreement signed on January 23 in La Paz between port authorities of both countries, in which the vice president of the ANP himself participated, by which the connectivity of that country's foreign trade with the Atlantic Ocean is facilitated through the Paraguay-Paraná waterway.
The interviewee identified the document as providing for differentiated treatment, which provides that the ANP grant the Bolivian port authority a 1.000 square meter space for storage in Montevideo and Nueva Palmira, and an office area for the administrative work of the ASP-B staff.
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