Talks are due to start between the Panama Canal Authority (ACP) and the international shipping community on the prickly subject of paying for a widened waterway when it opens in 2015.Price differentiation between the future locks and the current ones would be necessary, Quijano said, to ensure the canal’s original facilities continue to be attractive to operators of smaller vessels and to prevent older infrastructure becoming obsolete overnight.
Panama Canal Authority administrator, Jorge Quijano, told The Loadstar that he would arrive in London next week to meet with the International Chamber of Shipping (ICS) as part of the ACP’s policy of consultation with the industry ahead of any future toll increases.
A key element of the ACP’s future pricing strategy, Quijano revealed, would be a price differential between using the new mega-locks – capable of handling 13,000 teu vessels – and the cost of using the original locks, constructed nearly a hundred years ago.
