RIYADH, 8 December 2002 — The Kingdom has joined the elite club of shipbuilding nations with Zamil Operations and Maintenance Company (ZOMCO), a leading player in the operations and maintenance sector, announcing that it has started the construction of the first service ship to be completely built in a Saudi Arabian port.
Building of Zamil 25 began with fanfare in Dammam recently. The inaugural ceremony was attended by Naem Ebrahim Naem, general manager of King Abdul Aziz Port in Dammam.
Zamil 25 will be equipped to provide all kinds of maintenance inside offshore oil installations.
Zamil Al-Zamil, ZOMCO’s president, said the ship will be equipped to fight fire as per the specifications of Aramco specifications and American Bureau of Shipping (ABS), which oversees the technical construction of the ship. Al-Zamil said “we are very proud to be part of this memorable achievement”.
After Zamil 25, three more ships will be built in the Kingdom at a later stage. “We assure that these ships will have the highest quality and safety specifications,” said Al-Zamil.
Nearly 80 shipping companies operate in the Gulf states. They include the United Arab Shipping Company (UASC) and National Shipping Company of Saudi Arabia.
In 1999, the UASC, owned jointly by the five Gulf states and Iraq, acquired 10 new vessels at a total cost of $620 million. Similar purchases by other shipping companies are indicative of the fact that Saudi shipbuilding industry is poised for growth.
The Kingdom has eight commercial and industrial ports, equipped with state-of-the-art technology on a coastline extending more than 2,900 km on the Arabian Gulf and the Red Sea.
The number of docks in the Saudi ports has also gone up, resulting in the increase of dock productivity and reduction in the handling cost.
More than 14,000 ships visit the ports of the Kingdom annually, which means one ship arrives every 25 minute at one of the Saudi ports.
