Financial news
Mexico to invest $US 307.7bn in national infrastructure T
HE president of Mexico, Mr Enrique Peña Nieto, has announced a massive six- year national infrastructure investment programme, which is 50% greater than the previous plan.
Pesos 4000bn ($US 307.7bn) is to be invested up to 2018 to modernise and improve roads, railways, ports, airports and telecommunications. “This is a large investment programme, with necessary and urgent actions to consolidate Mexico as a true emerging economic
power this century,” says Peña Nieto. He says the national plan aims to turn Mexico into “a major global logistics hub with high added value.” The president believes the total investment could be even higher if the plan is approved by the Chamber of Deputies at the same time as the tax reform bill which is due to be submitted in September. He says the plan could “trigger public and private investment in this sector of up to Pesos 1300bn.”
“The size of these figures
reflects the government’s commitment to make transport and communications a strategic engine for national
development,” Peña Nieto says. There are three main goals:
to develop logistics to cut transport costs, improve safety, and to increase the value of
products made in Mexico to promote balanced regional
development, and to improve the quality of life for the population.
As far as rail is concerned,
GFR to acquire 75% of HŽ Cargo C
ROATIAN transport minister Mr Sinisa Hajdaš Doncic announced on July 22 that he expects the sale of a 75% stake in Croatian Railways (HZ) railfreight unit HZ Cargo to be completed this month, after the government selected Grup Feroviar Român (GFR), a subsidiary of Romania’s Grampet group, as its preferred bidder for the shares. Two other companies,
Rail Cargo Austria and AWT, Czech Republic, also submitted offers, but according to local press reports only the Romanian bid met the conditions of the tender.
The total value of the transaction is expected to be around Kuna 1.1bn ($US 190m). HZŽCargo carried
the president wants to see a revival of long-distance passenger services, which were virtually abandoned when National Railways of Mexico was split up and privatised. Agreements were signed in January for a new 245km passenger railway between Mexico City and Querétaro and a new 278km line from Merida to Puerto Venado, with trains operating at up to 180km/h. There will also be investment in urban rail networks.
around 12 million tonnes of freight, or 2.44 billion tonne- km, in 2011. HZ Cargo became a limited- liability company in 2007 as part of the restructuring of HZ into a holding company, and until now has remained a wholly-owned subsidiary of HZ Holding.
Record year for TFR
T
RANSNET Freight Rail (TFR), South Africa,
reported revenues of Rand 50.2bn ($US 4.99bn) for the year ending March 2013, a 9.4% year-on-year increase, as the company breached the Rand 50bn mark for the first time.
Photo: David Gubler
Talgo wins Kazakh coach order K
AZAKHSTAN Railways (KTZ) subsidiary
Passazhirskie Perevozki has awarded Talgo and its local joint venture Tuplar-Talgo a É482m contract to supply 603 coaches for long-distance services.
The vehicles will be formed into 21 sets and will be maintained by the supplier for 15 years in a deal worth around É1bn.
Components for the trains 16
will be manufactured at Talgo’s Spanish production units in Rivabellosa (Alava) and Las Matas (Madrid), with final assembly taking place at plants in Kazakhstan through a technology transfer deal with the Tuplar-Talgo facility in Astana, which opened in December 2011.
The trains will be capable of operating at up to 200km/h on 1520mm-gauge track and have been designed to withstand
extreme ambient conditions and temperatures as low as -50oC. They will also meet customs union requirements for Russia and Belarus. KTZ awarded Talgo a contract in November 2010 to supply 420 vehicles, which are being assembled in Astana. The Astana can produce up to 150 vehicles per year, and last year assembled 52 coaches. Tuplar-Talgo expects to build 158 coaches this year.
The result was achieved despite economic growth remaining below 2% for much of the year, which according to Transnet CEO Mr Brian Molefe dampened demand. However, the company’s strategy to attract more container freight to rail softened the effect of lower than expected coal exports as container and car volumes increased by 21.6% and Transnet set an overall record of 207.7 million tonnes. TFR CEO Mr Siyabonga Gama says coal export volumes disappointed as companies held on to reserves as coal prices softened towards the end of 2012. Gama says TFR expected to carry 75 million tonnes during the year, but only carried 69.2 million tonnes.
Molefe says the company’s rail business investment strategy helped overcome this decline in demand for coal. Despite warning that weak economic growth could force the company to scale back its ambitious investment programme, capital investment reached Rand 27.5bn in 2012, the largest amount ever in a single year.
IRJ August 2013
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