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Issue 2 2021 - FBJNA


there and Zeebrugge. Another


strand to Celtic’s


Project freight has helped keep Dublin-based Celtic Shipping Agencies busy over the past few months, says operations director David Lee. The operator, which is a member of the XL Projects network


of specialist forwarders, is handling an increasing amount of oversize cargo on the weekly K Line KESS short sea ro ro service from Zeebrugge into Dublin. Indeed, traffic on this routing has increased in


preference to Southampton since Brexit at the end of the year, says Lee. Other ro ro services are


available via Antwerp and Celtic is considering setting a road shunt service between


business is windfarm work for GE into both Waterford, about 80 miles south of Dublin, and Foynes to the west of Limerick. The forwarder has an office in Waterford and a storage area, which has handled a number of cargoes, including some for the Dublin region. The latter included a major


shipment for a new Intel computer chip plant at Leixlip,


///BREAKBULK


to the west of Dublin, with 18 metre long, 4m wide and high pieces shipped into Waterford from Houston and then, following storage in Celtic’s yard, moved overnight by road to Leixlip. “Initially, the operation was


set to use Dublin port, but that wasn’t ideal,” Lee explained. “The roads in Dublin port are very challenging and there is also the Dublin port tunnel to deal with, so we pushed for Waterford instead.” While using a port 80 miles


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from the city might seem counter-intuitive to some, Waterford is only a


couple


of miles from the national motorway network allowing the pieces to be brought on unrestricted route to within a couple of miles of the final destination. Waterford is also a good base for the windmills destined for


the centre of the country, while the deepwater, mainly bulk port of Foynes serves the west and Kerry region. Ireland is fast catching up


with the UK and rest of Europe in developing wind power, including a major offshore project at Arklow Bank, which could use the ports of Dublin, Rosslare,


Waterford and


Arklow. Celtic Shipping has already handled exploration vessels for this project at Dun Laoghaire, a small port south of Dublin that older readers will remember as the terminal of Stena Line services from Holyhead for many years. There are still a couple of small berths available for cargo at Dun Laoghaire and Celtic Shipping has handled large brewing tanks for Guinness’ St James Gate brewery in Dublin there, though the road journey isn’t the easiest.


UpCargo seeks top ranking for central American freight industry


Panama and its canal sit literally astride the world’s shipping lanes, so it is no surprise to learn that


it is


developing into a major hub for project as well as other types of freight. Local agent UpCargo Logistics, for example has been handling shipments of windfarm spares for Danish


manufacturer


Vestas throughout the Central America and Caribbean region, explains president Rolando Alvarez. UpCargo has been working


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hard to build up a network of agents in the central American and Caribbean region but it can be difficult to find good ones, he says. Alvarez, who sits on the


board of the Panamanian Association of Freight Forwarders as well as on the FIATA global forwarders’ federation, is working hard to raise the standard of logistics education by developing a logistics diploma for Latin America. Already available in Panama, Chile and Mexico, the aim is to roll it out to other countries in the region


and so boost standards and understanding of the industry. It will be taught in Spanish – the predominant language of most countries in the region – but students will learn key English terms as part of their training. English is in fact widely spoken and understood in Panama itself – the US maintained a presence in the Canal Zone until 1999 – but less predominant in the other countries. Panama’s logistics industry


is also well developed and it is in fact the predominant hub for all of central America. The Canal is a major revenue generator for the government and there are five major ports on the Atlantic and Pacific coasts which are important maritime hubs for other countries, able to handle the largest main line break bulk vessels with transhipment to smaller ships able to penetrate the smaller ports in central America and on the Caribbean islands. “We can receive cargo here in Panama and transload


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