Regular container handling began in Kiel recently with the arrival in the port’s Ostuferhafen of the first 100 20ft containers from Riga on board the MS Vera Rambow. The Managing Director of the Port of Kiel (SEEHAFEN KIEL GmbH & Co KG) Dirk Claus said: “This is an important step in the development of our port. Container handling represents a new business sector for Kiel." The new container transport service between Riga and Kiel is based on the shipment of ferroalloys - high value supplement materials for the west European and Scandinavian steel industries. The Baltic Terminal Kiel International GmbH (BTKI) has been able to clinch a long-term contract to handle them. The aim is to turn round 10,000 TEUs in the Ostuferhafen in the first year. BTKI Managing Director Jan-Rainer Straßburg said “Once Kiel has established itself as part of the transport chain, then handling volumes will rise over the coming years."
The ferroalloys are produced and packed into containers in Kazakhstan in Central Asia. The containers are then transported from Kazakhstan on block train services to Latvia. In the port of Riga they are loaded onto ocean-going ships destined for Kiel. On arrival in Kiel, those containers with ferroalloys that have already been sorted are loaded straight onto rail. Any unsorted products are sorted in closed warehouses in the Ostuferhafen. Depending on volume and destination, on-shipment is by truck, rail or by inland waterway – the latter something now planned for the future. Empty containers are sent back to the shippers via Kiel and Riga.
The container handling in the Ostuferhafen is the result of a co-operation contract signed at the start of this year by BTKI and the Port of Kiel. To facilitate handling, the port has invested in its own brand-new mobile port crane. For its part, BTKI is responsible for delivering and positioning the containers in the port using its own mobile equipment, as well as for operating the container depot and for sorting the ferroalloys, where necessary, in the warehouses.
The SEEHAFEN KIEL operates Kiel’s commercial port on behalf of the Schleswig-Holstein state capital of Kiel and is a 100% subsidiary company of the City. The Ostuferhafen is the biggest port site on the Kiel Fjord and the hub of roll-on/roll-off liner shipping activity with Russia and the Baltic region. There are regular shipping services from here to Klaipeda, St. Petersburg and Kaliningrad. BTKI is a subsidiary of Britain’s TSG Group and has been active in Ostuferhafen cargo handling and warehousing services since 2003.
