2024-09-18 14:39:30
A large storm water causes a large air lock of the Ouistreham locks (Calvados). September 11, 2024 in the middle of the afternoon, Hizir made his entry, led by a small boat. There is a 120 m freighter to fill your brakes with the main component of…cat litter. The water rose, and a few dozen minutes later, the gates opened on the other side to let the boat go up the canal towards the port of Blainville-sur-Orne, a few kilometers upstream. The end of a crossing that began in the middle of the day with the departure of the Lady Hestia, an orange freighter has around one hundred meters which has carried wood from the North.
Antoine de Gouville, director of port facilities at the Caen Chamber of Commerce and Industry said: “Our plan is to make handmade products for small traffic. Like the famous feline litter, which arrived on the banks of the river to be instead. In total, “103 cargo ships passed through the Ouistreham locks last year,” said Éric Destable, port manager. A presence that has been growing for many years. In late summer, activity is 7% ahead of the cereal season, with forecasts being more moderate than usual.
The agri-food industry weighs 250,000 to 300,000 tons per year in the hold of ships, a good part of which is cereals. On the list for Caen’s diversification: 100,000 tons of fertilizer, 30,000 to 40,000 tons of animal feed, as much for litter and, more recently, the rise of recycling waste. Shredded tires, but also “scrap metal to be exported for recycling. The project has almost disappeared and is at a good start with 50,000 tons last year and already 60,000 tons in 2024,” notes Antoine de Gouville. Growing and promising niches.
Focus on local businesses
However, it is not possible to go to titillate neighbors in Rouen and Le Havre. “On the boxes, we don’t even try to compete. In Normandy, it is very competitive,” confirms Antoine de Gouville. Le Havre is a heavyweight in Europe, an important port for French foreign trade. So Caen and its canal are working hard to build good relationships with businesses at a more local level. The port also benefits from a constant water level at the terminal, which avoids flow obstacles, and interesting storage capabilities, especially for bulk cargo or wood, which Blainville-sur-Orne cranes regularly lift.
The commercial port of Caen is still struggling after suffering greatly from the loss of the Sociétémetallurgique de Normandie. In the golden age of the large company in the Caen region (more than 6,000 workers in the 1960s), some 500,000 tons of steel were exported by sea. Those, of today, of Blainville, bear witness to the current business, under the eyes of cyclists and walkers who watch freighters loading or unloading from the greenway.
Activity at the dock has increased in recent years, as has the back room, with up to fifty companies based in the terminal area. Among them, let’s just mention Ayro, one of the new arrivals, which builds… wings for commercial ships, for a green release. The wings already worn by Canopée, the first and oldest modern ship, in October 2023, of the components of the Ariane 6 rocket to Guyana.
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