In the month of March, 2015, Ghana as an independent state turns 58. In this regard, LMS would like to enlighten it's blog followers on how far the nation has come in the development of its maritime infrastructure. This blog being the first part of a two part series, we will consider the Tema Harbour and Port.
The Tema Harbour is located in Tema at the southeastern part of Ghana, along the Gulf of Guinea.
The construction of the harbour was proposed by the British who ruled the Gold Coast before its independence. An old fishing village called Torman was the proposed site for the harbour's construction.
The rapid industrialization that followed Ghana's independence led to the town adopting the name Tema from that of the fishing village. After independence, Ghana's first president Kwame Nkrumah, begun the construction of the harbour in the 1950s and commissioned it in 1962.
The harbour lies along the Gulf of Guinea and is 18 miles from Accra, the capital of Ghana. The harbour has a water-enclosed area of 1.7 million square metres and covers a total land area of 3.9 million square metres. The harbour lies on a 410 acres (166 hectares) of sea.The harbour has 5 kilometres of breakwaters, 12 deepwater berths, one oil-tanker berth, one dockyard, warehouses, and transit sheds.
In the east of the lee breakwater is a fishing harbour with cold-storage and marketing facilities that handles fishing processing.
The harbour handles 80% of Ghana's national exports and imports.
The Tema Harbour and Port of Tema is currently undergoing an expansion and investment of $115 million in infrastructural upgrading as part of efforts aimed at expanding facilities to meet rising cargo traffic by the The Ghana Ports and Harbours Authority (GHPA); and in which the expansion and investment will go into the purchase and installment of cranes, reach-stackers, ship to shore cranes, among others. The harbour upgrades will improve the cargo-handling capacity of the Tema harbour and port.
Happy 58th birthday to Ghana and a happy independence day celebration to all Ghanaians.
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