The logistics zone (ZAL Port) of the Port of Barcelona is receiving a loan from the EIB to finance the construction of new logistics and warehousing facilities enabling it to both increase its capacity and improve its efficiency and sustainability.
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The Port of Barcelona is one of the biggest in Spain and occupies a strategic position on routes within the Mediterranean Corridor.
Increasing its logistics capacity will therefore have a positive impact on the Port Barcelona, a piece of strategic infrastructure in this corridor.
The Vice-President of the European Investment Bank (EIB), Román Escolano, and the Director General of ZAL Port, Alfonso Martínez, have signed in Barcelona a €75 million loan backed by the guarantee of the Investment Plan for Europe.
The agreement was made possible by the support of the European Fund for Strategic Investments (EFSI), the central pillar of the Investment Plan for Europe, the so-called “Juncker Plan”.
Specifically, the project will enable the Port of Barcelona to increase its capacity to up to around 1,000,000 m² of prime logistics warehouses throughout ZAL Port.
This expansion of its logistics facilities will help to enable ZAL Port to increase its economic activity, as the occupation rate of its existing facilities is now at 97%.
The aim of the EIB and the Investment Plan for Europe with this loan is to boost growth and employment in Spain.
With the development of new facilities, the Port Barcelona will be able to reduce costs in the management of transport connections and be more competitive.
The new logistics infrastructure offer will enable the creation of some 4,000 new direct jobs and some 6,000 indirect jobs in the logistics and transport sectors. ■
A low pressure wave forming along a cold front will track across the New England coast this morning, bringing a period of rain, heavy at times for much of New England, especially for Maine today.