The Executive Vice-President and Spokesperson for PIPE, José Luis Almazán, and Álvaro Nadal, Head of the President’s Economic Bureau, were the protagonists of the forum organised by Agencia EFE on ‘The ports as Spain’s economic driver’.
During his participation in the forum, Almazán explained that, according to what the sector had been able to learn, the port authorities do not believe that they can get the binding reports necessary to resolve the requests before September 2016. ‘It is very worrying’ added Almazán, for whom it would be very important to have the processing stage finished as soon as possible—in other words—in the course of 2015.
The objective of this amendment is to increase economic activity and private investment, modernise the Spanish ports in terms of technology, and as a result, make them more competitive.
For Almazán, the extension of the concession period is “to change the direction” of the sector which had been severely affected by the decline in activity, as a result of economic recession, in a situation aggravated by overcapacity, high labour costs, and poor competitiveness.
Although approximately 480 million tonnes went through the Spanish ports in 2014—which is approaching the pre-crisis levels of 2007—Almazán bemoaned the loss of traffic equivalent to an entire year during the years of recession.