Bacolod City – The general manager of international shipping carrier Regional Container Lines is studying the possibility of having a vessel call in Bacolod City.
Marlon Isah De Guzman said they are planning to have regular vessel calls in the city, similar to what they have in Cebu and Manila, allowing the city to import and export their products directly to and from international markets.
“It’s like a farm-to-market road by the seas,” he said. They are planning to build the port so they can have direct access to their global markets for export products. Also, they can have importation directly from other countries, he added.
De Guzman said they don’t have to go by Manila and Cebu and add up to the transport cost for the items from Bacolod. They hope to have the plan done before the year ends.
“This one is actually bringing your farm directly to the market of international trade,” he said.
During a call at the mayor’s office Monday, Bacolod Mayor Alfredo Abelardo Benitez appears to have a very positive response because he sees the benefits of having lower transport and logistics costs. This is part of the Presidential agenda to lower the transport and logistics cost in the Philippines, De Guzman said.
“And one way of doing this is not really having to have a route between ports in the Philippines. But you can have a route directly international, particularly to RCL Singapore, which is the biggest transshipment hub in the world” he said.
De Guzman said they are not buying any land from the Bacolod Real Estate Development Corp. (BREDCO). But what they need from BREDCO is only its port operations site. (Chrysee Semillano via The Visayan Daily Star (TVDS), photo courtesy of TVDS)
