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Strong cargo growth boosts Tauranga port profit

NZPA

Thursday 18th August 2011

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Strong cargo growth and cost control helped Port of Tauranga lift full year underlying net profit 17.2 percent to $57.9 million.

Trade volumes in the year to June rose 12 percent from the a year earlier to more than to 15.4 million tonnes, while revenue was up 25.2 percent to $185.4m, the company said today.

Container traffic rose 15 percent to 590,506 TEUs (20-foot equivalent units) and now represented 40.5 percent of total trade through the port.

Activity at MetroPort, the container handling facility in the Auckland industrial belt, rose 20 percent to 138,000 TEUs.

Strong demand for commodity exports, particularly from Asia, and rising confidence in the dairy sector boosted break-bulk cargo volumes, the company said. Dairy trade through the port rose 4.6 percent to 588,000 tonnes.

Log export volumes rose 14.5 percent to 4.4m tonnes, while fertiliser import volumes rose 64 percent to 530,000 tonnes, and grain and dairy food supplement cargoes rose 26 percent to 1.1m tonnes.

Port of Tauranga's five associate companies and subsidiary Tapper Transport, with activities including on-wharf logistics and container cleaning and traditional port operations, contributed a net $12.4m to group net profit, up from $8.5m in 2010.

A final dividend of 21c per share is to be paid, on top of the interim dividend of 10cps, an increase of 6.9 percent on last year's dividend payout.

Port chief executive Mark Cairns said that while kiwifruit volumes held up during the year, the Psa bacterial vine disease was likely to weigh on export volumes as the disease begins to harm plant productivity.

Log export volumes had continued to strengthen over the year and the demand for New Zealand commodities looked to be robust for the foreseeable future with increased demand primarily from China and growth also coming from India.

Port of Tauranga shares were up 2c in early trade to $9.30.



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