30 Nov 2006
Dubai: Saudi Arabian steel firm Al Tuwairqi is building the first modern manufacturing mill in the Middle East to produce steel railway tracks, a move industry experts say will answer pent-up railway demand in the region.
The Dammam-based 500,000 square-metre plant to be opened in 2009 was made public at the Middle East Rail 2006 Conference. The cost of the project is $250 million.
Al Turwairqi spokesman Sudarshan Singh said there will never be a better time than now to think big in the Middle East.
A plan, he said, by the Saudi government to establish a railway link between the Red Sea through the UAE to the Arabian Sea is evidence that the future in the Gulf includes railway transportation.
Singh told Gulf News, "There's a big necessity for a new rail network in the region. This is the right time or otherwise we will be too late. The region is booming, the money is available, and there is demand."
He estimated that "four million tonnes of rail will be required in the next 10 years to build the rail network in the region."
By Derek Baldwin
Gulf News 2006. All rights reserved.
