APM Terminals won a $992.2 million concession to ramp up Costa Rica's Atlantic port of Moin, allowing the tropical fruit-shipping country to draw bigger ships by 2016, the firm said.

APM Terminals, the port operating arm of Danish shipping giant A.P. Moller-Maersk, said Costa Rica awarded the company a 33-year concession for the construction and operation of a new container terminal at Moin.

Moin and its sister Atlantic port of Limon ship three-quarters of Costa Rica's exports, mainly bananas and pineapples to the United States and Europe. But the state-run port authority has struggled to keep its facilities up to speed with world-class trading docks.

The private expansion project aims to more triple the loading capacity at the port.

The company will also deepen the channel to 60 feet (18 meters) and install state-of-the-art loading equipment, said Paul Gallie, APM Terminals' Americas director.

"With this type of infrastructure Costa Rica will be able to leap frog into the 21st century," Gallie told Reuters after a news conference in San Jose announcing the investment.

A $5.25-billion expansion of the Panama Canal is spurring ports in the region to revamp their facilities to receive larger ships.

Gallie expects construction to start in Jan 2013 and the new terminal could be operational by late 2015 or early 2016.

Costa Rica exported $9.37 billion worth of goods last year, according to the national trade promotion office.

By the end of President Laura Chinchilla's term in 2014 the government aims reach $17 billion in exports and the larger port will help towards that goal, Public Works and Transport Minister Francisco Jimenez told reporters.

Union organizers in the past have protested private concessions at the two main ports but dock workers have not threatened renewed strikes after the investment announcement.

The Moin terminal is just one of the planned revamps for the eastern province of Limon on Costa Rica's Caribbean coast, helping job growth in one of the country's poorer regions.

Other plans in the pipeline include a new oil terminal and a major $1 billion refinery upgrade in a possible joint effort by Costa Rican state refiner Recope and China's top state oil company CNPC. (Reuters)