APMT TO ACQUIRE SATELLITE-BASED CONTAINER POSITIONING, SYSTEM

Managing director of Nigeria's leading seaport concessionaire, APM Terminals Apapa Limited, Mr. Dallas Hampton said his company was making plans to install a satellite-based Global Positioning System (GPS) for containers to aid prompt service delivery at the port and currently constructing a N1.6 billion first of its kind in the world multi-level container inspection facility for physical examination of containers by Customs operatives.

According to Hampton, the satellite-based container location system will ensure 99.5 per cent accuracy of container location and inventory in the terminal yard.

The APMT boss said the GPS would be installed once ongoing civil works were complete and would become operational in the first quarter of 2014.

'Manual systems cannot achieve much more than 90 per cent accuracy. The GPS system will also enable the use of further technologies such as NAVIS Prime Route and Expert Decking which are advanced real time IT systems that can improve terminal yard efficiency. These systems combined will enable the terminal to have completely pedestrian free yards, and provide truck service times for receival and delivery which are less than 45 minutes on average,' Hampton told journalists in Lagos.

He also disclosed that his company is building a $10 million (about N1.6 billion) facility for physical inspection of containers by officials of the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS).

'The facility, the first of its kind in the world, will utilise a multi-level racking system operated by yard cranes,' Hampton said, adding that the insatiable demand by operatives of the NCS for physical inspection of containers was the main drive behind the US$10 million multi-level racking system investment.

'The multi-level facility is designed to reduce the footprint of the current inspection area and enable better use of what is effectively scarce terminal land for holding containers – which is after all the primary purpose of a container terminal.