Billion dollar ore terminal project at the Port of Suape will generate thousands of jobs and enable the completion of Transnordestina

Government of Pernambuco, management of the port complex and representatives of the company that will run the project met to make the announcement

A solid mineral bulk terminal will start to be installed in the Port of Suape from 2025, generating around 3 thousand direct and indirect jobs during the work. The port complex is located in the municipality of Cabo de Santo Agostinho, in the Metropolitan Region of Recife. The area destined for the development aimed at iron ores is 51,8 hectares. During the operation, more than 400 jobs should also arise. The announcement of the project, which will cost R$ 1,5 billion, was made jointly this week by the Government of Pernambuco, the management of the Port of Suape and representatives of the company Planalto Piauí Participações e Empreendimentos SA, a member of the group Bemisa Brasil Mineral Operation SA., a mining company authorized by the Federal Government to implement and operate the Sertão Railroad (EF233), along the 717 kilometers between Curral Novo (PI) and the port in Pernambuco.

The terminal will be located within the limits of the Industrial Port Zone (ZIP), on Cocaia Island, with an estimated handling of 13,5 million tons of iron ore per year. The railroad will allow the export of the product that Planalto Piauí Participações e Empreendimentos SA explores in the municipality of Curral Novo. There, there is a deposit with 800 million tons of iron, the largest mineral reserve in that state and one of the largest in Brazil.

The estimate of the Government of Pernambuco is that the terminal has the capacity to receive and ship 50 tons of iron ore per day, with the capacity to store 780 tons of the product in the yard. Once completed, the development should collect R$617,2 million in port fees and a total of R$184,5 million for leasing the area for 30 years, which is the period established by the contract between the government, the business group and Porto de Suape.

“It will be another fundamental logistical option, which will lower costs and provide conditions for the development of various sectors of Pernambuco's economy. This new terminal will also further enhance the use of Suape, that is, other states and even countries will have a new production outlet at the port, now through rail logistics”.

Paulo Câmara – Governor of Pernambuco

How the project can enable the completion of Transnordestina

Bemisa has authorization from the Ministry of Infrastructure to install the railroad, but it turns out that the stretch that goes from Piauí to Custódia has several pieces built by Transnordestina Logística S/A (TLSA). The company was in charge of the Ferrovia works, started in 2006 and still unfinished.

TLSA is a private company belonging to the CSNTLSA Group, which has already announced that it will only complete the stretch that connects Transnordestina to the Port of Pecém, in Ceará. The stretch that would reach the Port of Suape was abandoned.

The controversy continues to yield, as part of the business class defends that Bemisa and TLSA should enter into an agreement to complete the section of the Transnordestina that still remains to be done in Pernambuco. However, Bemissa informs that it will build a new railroad. The group is one of the largest in Brazil in the mineral exploration and export sector.

Since 2019, the company has been negotiating about the terminal at the Port of Suape with the Government of Pernambuco to be able to ship ores along the coast of Pernambuco. On September 2, the company presented its interest in making the railroad viable to the Ministry of Infrastructure.

“Pernambuco was a state that always received us very well. We have been discussing this possibility for some years now.”, said the CEO of Bemisa, 

Augusto Lopes – CEO of Bemisa

With good expectations for the generation of jobs, the CEO of the Port of Suape, Roberto Gusmão, points out that the arrival of the ore terminal is an important milestone for the region's economy.

“We are the main port in the Northeast and a hub for cargo, currently distributed by road and cabotage. With the railway network, the port will be able to move from soybeans from Matopiba, in the region between the states of Tocantins, Bahia, Piauí and Maranhão, to fruits from São Francisco and gypsum from the Sertão do Araripe, in addition to internalizing cargo such as fuel, cooking gas, containerized cargo, vehicles, among other goods, consolidating its integration into the region’s logistics network.”

Roberto Gusmão – CEO of the Port of Suape