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Both sides of the New Quay hard at work, loading timber and turbine towers from Vestas. |
WITH timber exports up by 20,000 tonnes and ever larger ships coming in, Campbeltown Harbour has had another good year.
Harbour master Willie MacDonald is encouraged by this year’s figures and feels the prospects for the next few years are promising.
A total of 114,000 tonnes of timber has been exported in 2008 with 45,000 tonnes of this going to the Baltic countries and the rest to the Port of Londonderry.
Bigger Loads
The number of visits by ships has decreased but those coming in have grown in size and been taking bigger loads away.
The last four or five ships in port have loaded double the amount of timber than that usually taken by the smaller, regular boats like the Red Duchess.
Tonnage of timber has almost doubled since 2006 when 62,000 tonnes was exported from Kintyre, which can only mean good things for the next few years.
Vestas has also continued regular visits with 27 cargo ships visiting over the last 12 months mainly exporting goods to Troon and Northern Ireland with the occasional load bound for Canada.
Importing
Ships from Poland have also been importing steel plates for Vestas.
As well as an increase in imports and exports, the harbour’s revenue for 2008 is up from 2007.
This is due to the larger ships coming in and the recent signing of a commercial contract between the NATO Jetty and Nordic Storage to store fuel.
As this is a commercial company, extra revenue will be gained for the use of the port, which covers Campbeltown Loch, from the harbour to Davaar Island.
The fishing fleet in general both from Campbeltown and Carradale has also had a good year particularly up to October time when a decline in landings began.
With the help of Irish fishing boats, the fishing industry still generates about 40 per cent of the harbour’s revenue.
Mr MacDonald said: ‘For the next few years the prospects are looking good for the harbour with the talk of the new marina which will go ahead and bigger ships coming in to export goods. The last four or five ships have been taking away 3,000 tonnes of timber. This is good news for the town in general which will increase our revenue even further.’
