Namport, Meatco in cooperation agreement

By Business Reporter

THE Namibian Ports Authority last week signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Meat Cooperation of Namibia (Meatco) which is aimed at enhancing Meatco’s trade abroad.
In essence, the two Namibian entities aim to use this collaboration to further strengthen their commercial ties by utilising the Port of Walvis Bay to export Meatco’s premium beef products and therefore add to the exportation volumes handled by Namport.
This partnership is beneficial to both commercial Namibian entities as beef products are destined to international markets such as USA, Europe, China, Norway and some parts of Africa.
Namport secures direct mainliner vessel connections to a majority of these destinations hence guaranteeing the shortest time to market and the preservation of Meatco products.

“This will heighten our competitiveness as organisations and as a country thus ensuring the greater attractiveness of Meatco’s products to international markets and directly promote Namport services to supply chains and potential meat exports in the SADC region from our respective hinterland markets such as Zambia, Zimbabwe and Botswana,” said Andrew Kanime, chief executive officer of Namport.
The agreement specifically focuses on ensuring the seamless, efficient and cost effective handling of Meatco products and jointly exploring new opportunities and the development of new technologies and facilities.

The relationship creates a value addition as the MoU will address training in accordance to skills transfer with respect to systems and processes related to Information Communication Technology platforms, hardware and software operating systems.
It is Namport’s vision to be the best performing sea ports in Africa and this aptly places the entity in a strong position to facilitate, enable and complement Meatco in its own strategic thrust to extend the reach of Namibia’s high quality meat and other products globally.