The port will install four new gantry cranes capable of loading and unloading the world’s largest container vessels, known as post-Panamax ships.

The new equipment will will sit alongside the port’s two new berths which will increase capacity at the site to 6 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs), from its present 4.5m TEUs. The new berths will be 18 metres deep.

The port will also buy four mobile harbour cranes, ten new spreaders that enable the cranes to pick up containers in pairs and 11 rubber-tyred gantry cranes.

Salalah Port Services recently posted a 144 per cent growth in net profit to RO1.56m ($4m) for the first quarter of 2008.