MEDENINE (TAP) - A ship from Italian city of Genoa berthed, on Monday, at the Zarzis trade port, loaded with 181 vehicles and 5 containers headed for Libya.
This is an experimental crossing, before the possible launching of a regular Genoa-Zarzis sea line. This trial is to determine efficiency of this sea shipping line to the Zarzis port and the Italian promoters who, before the Libyan crisis, headed to El Khoms port in Libya.
Since the crisis, the Zarzis port has been hosting ships destined to the Libyan market, mainly sailing from Russia. These ships are loaded with such foodstuff as rice, flour, soya, wheat, bananas as well as vehicles and other goods like marble and woods.
Once arrived to the port, these goods are transferred to Libya via the Ras Jedir border crossing, which needs some thirty heavy lorries per day and offers between 50 and 100 jobs. The volume of these exchanges destined to Libya is estimated at 64,000 tonnes.
Thus, the Zarzis trade port is experiencing an intense activity. Six ships arrived on Tuesday from Russia loaded with wheat and rice. The port has the capacity of receiving more than four ships a day.
In addition to the goods destined to Libya, the Zarzis port registered, during the first half of 2011, a volume of exchanges of 512,000 tonnes.
© Tunis-Afrique Presse 2011
