Conversations to explore a sustainable shipping season throughout the year in the port of Deepwater more a day in Canada are launched, after an agreement between the port -owned group and a dry bulk shipping company based in Montreal.
The port of Churchill in northern Manitoba, which has a brief operational window every summer, is owned and operated by Arctic Gateway Group, an association of dozens of communities of the first nations and Hudson Bay.
Signed a memorandum of understanding with Fednav, a International Bulk shipping company, to evaluate a shipping season throughout the year sustainable and commercially supported for the port, said Arctic Gateway in a press release on Friday.
Fednav operates a fleet of approximately 120 vessels that deliver more than 30 million tons of load every year, and has decades of experience in the navigation of Arctic Waters and the great lakes, according to the statement.
“They are a perfect solution of the private sector to obtain greater access to the port of Churchill,” said Chris Avery, CEO of Arctic Gateway.
The association is “a natural evolution” for Churchill and Canada as a whole, as the port advances towards being able to send energy, agriculture and western critical minerals to international markets, he said.
“As we advance, we know that our clients will seek loaders who specialize, that they know how to operate in the north,” he said.
Although the port operates in a four -month schedule, Avery said the University of Manitoba’s research shows that shipping lanes through Hudson Bay can currently open for six months a year without ice switches.
Research has shown that climate change is slowly eliminating the annual freezing of the bay, opening shipping lanes throughout the year within the next generation or two, Avery said.
Shipping access throughout the year through the port is a high priority for the property group, and try to move towards that, while fulfilling their mandate to ensure that the northern and indigenous communities are participating and complete beneficiaries.
“We believe that the port of Churchill has shipping access throughout the year … it’s really a game change,” Avery said.
‘Beginning of a labor relationship’
The commercial tensions of Canada United States aroused a renewed interest in the port of Churchill earlier this year, with the Prime Minister of Manitoba, Wab Kinew, saying that it could be a good option to boost trade with Europe, and the expansion could fit with the Federal Government Plan for the Construction Infrastructure of the Nation.
In recent years, federal and provincial governments have invested millions of dollars in the railway line and the port to ensure a commercial route through Hudson Bay and the Arctic to foreign markets.
Stéfany Corey, Senior Communications Manager of Fednav, said it is one of the only companies in the world that is sent through the Arctic throughout the year, and has three ships and three ice switches doing that job.
“We want to make sure that we are taking advantage of our different areas of specialization, and we feel that we can both work together to explore if this is something that we can operate in a variable way throughout the year,” News told CBC on Friday.
“We not only have ice switches, we also have a complete equipment that understands the tests and opportunities in the Arctic.”
The two will begin conversations in October, he said.
“It is the beginning of a working relationship that we are eager to explore.”
