BRINGING BULK OPERATIONS INTO the MODERN AGE Beth Maundrill, Editor, PTI, Spoke to Roger Clasquin, Chief Commercial Officer, RAK Ports

STRENGTHENING THE SUPPLY CHAIN

BRINGING BULK OPERATIONS INTO THE MODERN AGE Beth Maundrill, Editor, PTI, spoke to Roger Clasquin, Chief Commercial Officer, RAK Ports

Situated in the northernmost emirate of Also at Saqr Port the RAK group handles ernment enforced lockdowns, and the UAE the UAE, Ras Al Knaimah, RAK Ports acts around 70 million tonnes of dry bulk per is no exception. as an important maritime gateway for year. Most of the cargo is sent to the Middle For the RAK Ports group this meant tak- bulk cargo. East and South Asia, 40% to Kuwait, 40% to ing measures to keep its workforce safe Speaking to Port Technology Interna- India, 10% to Bangladesh and the remain- and the port 100% operational. Clasquin tional, Roger Clasquin, Chief Commercial ing 10% to various other nearby nations. noted that one of the greatest challenges Officer, RAK Ports, described the needs of a Products are mainly mineral products that was maintaining an intelligent spread of the modern port specializing in break bulk, the are sourced from the Al Hajar Mountains workforce which sees around 1,500 trucks effects of COVID-19 on the port and what which provide a backdrop for the Port. It is per day enter the Port’s land, this could be the future holds for the location. a key supply chain partners for quarries and 3,000 during peak times. Fortunately, the RAK Ports comprises five locations, Al the cement industry. Port has had no cases of the COVID-19 virus Jeer Port, Saqr Port, RAK Maritime City, Ras At the RAK Maritime City location RAK at its facility, in part by segregating the staff. Al Khaimah Port and Al Jazeera Port. The Ports deals with a total of 22 tenants with The Port is also testing everyone that en- Port group has recently received infrastruc- waterside access, shipyard facilities and a ters the port, including the numerous truck ture and equipment investments in excess feeder service from Saqr Port into Jebel Ali. drivers. of $250 million. RAK provides services ranging from cargo Obviously there has been an impact on The container terminal at Saqr Port has handling, free zone land lease, ship repair, volumes of cargo to some extent but un- been operated by Hutchinson Ports since warehousing, training, marine and anchor- like its neighbouring large container ports, 2017 and has a modest 350,000 TEU capac- age services to cruise tourism. RAK Ports is not solely dependent on the ity. With Jebel Ali Port in Dubai operated retail market. by DP World boasting an annual traffic of COVID-19 RESPONSE AT THE PORT On cargo, Clasquin said that there has almost 19 million TEU Saqr Port servers a At the time of writing most nations are be- been an impact on volumes mainly related smaller, local market. ginning to emerge from some type of gov- to the end markets that the Port serves be-

16 EDITION 97 WWW.PORTTECHNOLOGY.ORG STRENGTHENING THE SUPPLY CHAIN

cause of the lockdowns that have been im- are now beginning to explore smart tech- vendors focus on container traffic and posed by various governments. Overall, he nologies. very few specialise in dry bulk. said, RAK Ports has coped well. Unlike container ports, bulk operations Envision’s customers include the Sharjah The Port closely interacts with its cus- are not typically associated with the Inter- National Oil Corporation and the Port of Fu- tomers regarding volume planning as it net of Things (IoT), Artificial Intelligence (AI) jairah, both located in the UAE. seeks to keep its workforce occupied and and similar technologies. Clasquin said the implementation of this flexible when it comes to sudden volume However, in September 2019 the group type of software represents a “quantum increases and decreases. Most of the India- commissioned Envision to implement a leap” for contemporary port operations. bound exports are destined for steel mills, port community system and a port operat- He acknowledged that RAK Ports may be which Clasquin notes is an “anti-cyclical” ing system using the company’s iPortman lagging behind the likes of Abu Dhabi Ports market and is not as heavily driven by retail and Rubus software. The move to a more on the technological front, but this is due to and consumer markets. advanced system comes as handling 70 mil- the many more transactions involved with For Kuwait it is predominantly construc- lion tons of cargo and receiving 2,000 ships container vessels compared with the bulk tion materials. Clasquin said it is typical that per annum is no longer practical with man- cargo RAK deals with. governments will look to put money back ual systems. Rubus software is also used to Together with its customers the group is into the economy by stimulating big infra- help with predictive maintenance and hard- trying to be adaptive, agile and resilient in structure projects, which of course is good ware planning. order to move an unpredictable and fluctu- news for bulk cargo. Work on the system begin in 2019 as RAK ating amount of cargo. While there may be Clasquin said that they will probably not Ports looked to define the scope of the sys- fewer transactions and the customers may be structurally hit by a volume reduction. tem and speak to its customers about their be a far cry from those that are implement- While it is currently slower, this is largely due needs. It is expected that the port commu- ing their own IoT and AI technologies, RAK to lockdown measures at various locations. nity system will be rolled out in stages by Ports is looking at how best to achieve top the end of 2020. preforming operations with relevant tech- ENHANCING OPERATIONS AT A BULK PORT The Port had discussed with various nology implementation. While most of the operations carried out other vendors but ultimately chose Envi- Clasquin also noted that the sharing of on site regarding bulk cargo are very ru- sion because it already has a presence in data has become ever more important and dimentary, according to Clasquin, they the Middle East. He also noted that many because of this RAK needs to ensure it has the systems to support this. On cost saving, which is often a great driver in the adoption of new technologies, Clasquin pointed out that products such as limestone have a typical value of $10-15 per tonne. It is not practical to have a state of the art outfit for this type of cargo, he said, it must be “fit for purpose and modern”. But even if 10 pence can be saved from supply chain costs for the products, it is 70 million times that per annum. Reducing the supply chain costs comes with better planning and better systems with the help of Envision and the port community and operating system. For the future, Clasquin said that the group continues to invest in the expansion of its ports as the demand for new land with water connectivity increases. The project is still in the early stages but will be one of the Port’s main focuses over the nexcouple of years.

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