Tecon Santa Catarina

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In August 2005, Tecon Santa Catarina (TCS) consortium signed an agreement with the state governor of Santa Catarina to develop a new, modern container port in Itapoa Bay of Babitonga, Santa Catarina state. The container port was designed with a 450,000 teu capacity as well as three berths at the end of a pier that would reduce the cost required for dredging but were expected to increase the operating costs of the terminal. With a depth of 16 m, the port was designed to handle the world’s largest container vessels Tecon Santa Catarina (TCS) consortium, the project company, was owned by private companies Alianca Navegacao e Logistica Ltda (30%) and Batistella Group (70%). The first investor was a subsidiary of German Hamburg Sud Group. Financial closure was reached in November 2007, when a US $144 million loan was approved by the Inter-American Development Bank. The package comprised an IDB loan of up to US $57.6 million from the Bank’s ordinary capital and approximately US $86.4 million of co-financing from commercial banks. The port was designed and implemented by project investors to meet Santa Catarian’s growing demand for port capacity to handle refrigerated cargo, including chicken, pork, and other products. The new port, whose construction started in March 2007, was scheduled to begin commercial operations in the 1st semester of 2010. In June 2009, the project company was granted a BRL 330 million 10-year loan by BVA Bank to finance the investment in the terminal (11% interest rate was set to be charged plus an adjustment for annual inflation). Operations on the facility commenced in December 2010.