Orna Hozman-Bakur: “We must privatize the Port of Ashdod, the buyer will not have to invest in it”

by time news

The National Infrastructure Conference

“Whoever buys Ashdod Port will receive a very advanced port on a platter with the most advanced technologies available. We are in a win-win situation. The buyer who comes to buy will not have to invest in the port. The next government will have to deal with the privatization of Ashdod Port. There are five private ports and one governmental one, and if We want it to be bustling with life, we will have to privatize it” – this is what Orna Hozman-Bakur, chairman of the Port of Ashdod, said today in a conversation with Calcalist reporter Amir Kurtz as part of Calcalist’s national trade infrastructure and innovation conference at the Port of Ashdod.

Do you still suffer from traffic jams at the port?

“For the past few weeks there have been no traffic jams. How did it happen that there are traffic jams in the ports? In the last two years we experienced a very big crisis in the supply chain due to the corona virus. We managed to forget about it, but only last week China closed its doors again, and not to forget the war between Russia and Ukraine. We had to give the answer for ships. Also, Ashdod port is in a very strategic location that also suffered from two military operations and the workers didn’t have time to work all that time. At the peak there were really 100 ships at the gates of Israel’s ports, but we also suffered from that.”

What are the biggest challenges today? What about the competition with the private ports? How are you coping?

“We had to prepare the port for competition. When I took office, we made decisions on investments totaling NIS 2.4 billion in a deep-water dock that would compete with the private ports. We introduced technologies of cranes that would be operated by remote joystick. We turned the port of Ashdod from low-tech to high-tech. These are decisions that will affect a decade forward”.

What will the privatization of Ashdod port do to the workers? Have you tried to promote efficiency and retirement of employees and it was not so successful?

“A year ago we signed an agreement and reached an understanding with the workers. Privatization is part of the reform agreement because when the port is privatized, the workers will get what they deserve in the agreement. The workers understand that the new port is already happening. They leave the old world and see the cranes of the new world 100 meters away From them. They understand that they are in a world of competition and it will only be about one thing – service – and therefore need to be more efficient and more helpful.”

The port does not have a permanent CEO, and the previous one left in harsh tones
. How do you deal with these new challenges without a permanent CEO?

“Eli Bar Yosef, the acting CEO today, is one of the oldest VPs in the company who served as VP of Customers. When they say “Show Me The Money is the person, if you want to understand what the port makes a living from and who its customers are. There is good management here and an excellent board of directors with people with diverse experience.”

What are the most innovative things that can be found in the port today?

“I recently went on a tour of several ports in the world and we saw simple technologies there and we didn’t understand why we don’t do it. Why do our drivers still come with papers, why there is no identification of truck drivers, why there is no app that centralizes things. We returned to Israel, and did an RFI to understand what can improve the quality of the port. We took 12 companies and opened the playing field for them. Today there are 62 start-up companies operating in the port and we approved to buy technologies from four of them. For example, when there are problems with cranes it disables activity. One of the companies came and told us that they have a way to anticipate maintenance – This reduces crane failures by tens of percent.”

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