Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah Port, the first privately-owned and operated port in the kingdom, handled 821,694 twenty-foot equivalent units (TEU) in the first half of 2017, up 14 per cent from the container volume it handled for the same period in 2016.

The number of vessels that called at the port during the same period also increased by 14 per cent.

The port’s container terminal handled a total of 1.4 million TEU in 2016.

The port’s owner and developer, Ports Development Company (PDC), signed a SR2.7bn ($720m) Islamic facility with local Arab National Bank and Saab to finance the second phase of the port in 2016.

The facility will fund the expansion and development of the port’s southern basin, which includes an additional container terminal, a roll on-roll-off terminal and a bulk cargo terminal. It will increase the port’s total capacity to 6 million TEU annually.

When fully completed, the port is expected to have a design capacity of up to 20 million TEUs, comparable to Dubai’s Jebel Ali Port, 1.5 million vehicles (CEU) and 15 million tons of clean bulk cargo every year.

King Abdullah Port is strategically located on the Red Sea coast. It occupies a total area of 15 square kilometres and enjoys close proximity to King Abdullah Economic City.