PORT of Rotterdam`s expansion of reclaimed land of 1,000 hectares in Maasvlakte 2 for container operators will create losses at Europe Container Terminals (ECT), a unit of Hong Kong`s Hutchison Port Holdings (HPH) which will lose out in the arrangement.
"Imagine if someone decided to give each airline their own runway right next to Schiphol Airport. How do you think Schiphol would respond?" said John Meredith, HPH managing director John Meredith, who finds the attitude by the Dutch government unacceptable.
Under the plan, customers will move from Maasvlakte to the new terminal when it opens in 2014, announced Dutch Infrastructure and Environment Minister Melanie Schultz van Haegen.
"What she`s really saying is that there are people coming to set our house on fire, so we should go and buy fire extinguishers," Mr Meredith said.
ECT must occupy the second terminal of a port designed to become a hub-and-spoke port, a strategy to rationalise services into European ports by diverting from other North Sea ports such as the UK`s HPH-operated Felixstowe, said a report from London`s International Freighting Weekly.
Mr Meredith noted that the new terminal will be operated by rival DP World, which means that foreign investors, such as itself, which have EUR1.5 billion (US$1.9 billion) in the existing ECT will suffer losses.
Mr Meredith is critical of the port authority`s decision to allocate land to ECT clients muddling the relationship between stevedores and shipping lines. "You don`t do that with an airport, do you?"