By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

A Cabinet minister yesterday said the Government is "moving quickly" to put both Abaco's commercial ports out to bid amid assertions that the northern location needs a $60m upgrade to make it commercially viable.

Jobeth Coleby-Davis, minister of transport and housing, in a messaged reply to Tribune Business inquiries said the Attorney General's Office is reviewing draft tender documents for bidding processes that will seek qualified groups to redevelop, operate and manage both the Marsh Harbour and North Abaco ports under a private-public partnership (PPP) arrangement.

Pledging that the Government is "committed" to developing both facilities, she added that her ministry is continuing to plot the way forward and said: "Greater details will be shared with the people of Abaco in short order.

"Specifically, I can confirm that my ministry is in active communication with the Office of the Attorney General. They are reviewing draft Requests for Proposal (RFP) for both ports, and we are moving for a quick resolution and to have final drafts available for public review. As the minister of transport and housing, I understand the importance of the ports to the economic growth of Abaco. I will have much more to say in a few weeks."

Mrs Coleby-Davis spoke as the North Abaco Pastors Association, an alliance of pastors from the area between Treasure Cay and Crown Haven, served notice of their intent to today launch a petition requesting that the Government ensure the $41m North Abaco port is fully opened and operational.

Captain Scott Bootle, a member of the North Abaco Port Company that approached the former Minnis administration about taking over the location via a PPP arrangement, yesterday told this newspaper that the Bahamian people have received little to no return on their $41m investment in a facility that was constructed by China Harbour Engineering Company (CHEC) and turned over to the Government in 2018.

While it was subsequently employed for the distribution of Hurricane Dorian relief, it is still today not used for commercial shipping purposes and has only a few Customs officers based there to deal with private shipments. Confirming that the North Abaco facility is handling "just minor cargo, nothing to boast about", Captain Bootle said: "If you've spent $41m you have to make it work because you're paying back the Chinese every penny of that investment.

"The Bahamian people have to get a return on their investment. It has a lot of potential, especially after you dredge it. We have dredging companies we're in contact with to do that exercise. We're looking to go down to 35 feet. Right now were at 16 feet in the basin at high tide. Abaco needs a serious deep water port. You cannot grow the Abaco economy with a port that has 16 feet of water. That's not good when you want to grow your third largest economy."

Captain Bootle argued that dredging the North Abaco port to 35 feet depth would open up the facility to use by commercial shipping, including large 3,000 ton vessels. This, in turn, would open up the possibilities for the Cooper's Town location to become a transshipment, break bulk and logistics facility for cargo bound for the US, Canada and other regions.

While this would mean competing directly with Freeport, which already enjoys tax incentive and other cost advantages via the Hawksbill Creek Agreement, Captain Bootle said Abaconians and Bahamian taxpayers can ill-afford to simply let a $41m port infrastructure asset deteriorate and whittle away through lack of use and maintenance.

Suggesting that some 1,200 square feet of additional dock space can be created, he added that bunkering, warehousing and boat/yacht storage were other markets that the Cooper's Town port can potentially target. "It has 22,533 square feet of warehouse now," Captain Bootle said. "You can built out another 150,000 square feet of warehouse. We just have to put enough time in and get it working.

"One of the potential uses we're looking at is bunkering. Some of the major companies looked at it and want to do bunkering. BP looked at it, Sun Oil came in and looked at it..... I think for right now we're looking at a $60m investment to dredge the port and refit it the way it has to be done. Then we expect to bring quite a bit of material out the ground when we dredge, and we can distribute that.

"We can get the port in North Abaco dredged and kill two birds with one stone. We can give Abaco its deep water port, and the dredged material can be taken to Grand Bahama and raise the airport up to stop the flooding. It makes sense. The Ministry of Works looked at it and said it makes sense. We're just waiting for the RFP to come out right now."

The Government has been promising to seek a PPP arrangement for the Marsh Harbour port, which has never fully recovered or been rebuilt from Hurricane Dorian's devastation, since the Minnis administration was in office in 2021.

Mrs Coleby-Davis and her ministry, shortly after the Davis administration was elected to office on September 16, 2021, issued an expression of interest (EOI) seeking to gain an understanding of the appetite financiers, developers and port managers have for taking over and reconstructing/operating the Marsh Harbour port.

Dion Bethell, president and chief financial officer of BISX-listed Arawak Port Development Company (APD), confirmed to Tribune Business that the Nassau Container Port operator had responded to the EOI indicating its desire to become involved and bid on the Marsh Harbour port if the opportunity arose. However, no reply was received from the Government.

Under a PPP model, private capital would be responsible for financing the Marsh Harbour port’s transformation and upgrade. The facility would likely remain in the Government’s ownership, but be leased to a private sector operator for a long-term period, with the fees and charges levied on areas such as container throughput and storage helping to repay the earlier reconstruction financing while also generating an investment return for the manager and its shareholders.

The Government could also opt to take an equity ownership interest in the port operator itself, as it has done with APD. Mrs Coleby-Davis, addressing the September 2022 Abaco Business Outlook conference, agreed that “very little action” has been taken to rebuild Marsh Harbour’s commercial shipping port - the main freight gateway into the island - in the three years since the facility was destroyed by Hurricane Dorian.

However, she said then that “more information will be shared with Abaconians in short order” on plans to develop a replacement via a public-private partnership (PPP). “I wish to advise efforts to rebuild an efficient and secure port system are underway,” she promised. “A PPP was sought to create the performance dynamics of a modern port and develop quality infrastructure for every dollar invested.”