COUNTRY BRIEFING

FROM THE ECONOMIST INTELLIGENCE UNIT

The New Mangalore Port Trust (NMPT), India’s seventh-largest port, plans to invest Rs71bn over the next seven years to build a liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal and a new container terminal. The port will also build four additional berths, iron- and coal-handling terminals, and dry-dock repair facilities. The planned expansion will increase NMPT’s annual cargo-handling capacity from 38m tonnes to 52m tonnes. The port expects to handle 20,000 containers in 2006/07, up from 15,000 in 2005/06.