Central to the success of the Richards Bay and Empangeni regions as a growth zone - now combined into the city of uMhlathuze as of August last year - is the harbour itself, which was opened on April 1 1976.
It's the largest in SA, with a total land and water surface of 2 157 ha and 1 443 ha respectively and only 40% of the land area has been developed, which provides scope for further expansion through development up the floodplain of the Mhlatuze River.
It's in keeping with this long-term strategy that various expansion projects are being considered for the harbour - one of them being the construction of a dry dock able to handle the largest bulk carrier vessels.
Richards Bay was built as a bulk port to handle 26 Mt/year of coal within 10 years, but has since surpassed that modest target. The port handles more than 80 Mt annually - of which about 66 Mt is coal - representing about 57% of SA's seaborne cargo.
During 1976 136 vessels called to utilise five cargo berths situated on 1 500 m of quays, and exports amounted to just 6,9 Mt. In the 2001/2002 financial year 1 667 vessels called at Richards Bay, which now has 21 cargo berths on 6 363 m of quays. There are six cargo-handling terminals at Richards Bay. The Dry Bulk Terminal, run by SA Port Operations (Sapo), handles a variety of ores, minerals and wood chips. Sapo also runs the Multi-Purpose Terminal, which handles a variety of breakbulk cargoes.
The Richards Bay Coal Terminal (RBCT) is the largest, single export coal terminal in the world. The Island View Storage, operated by Richards Bay Bulk Storage, handles a range of bulk liquids and the Richards Bay Bunker Terminal imports bunker fuel from Durban and Cape Town. Finally, there's the Sasol Agri acid terminal, which exports phosphoric acid.
Richards Bay is a deep-water harbour dredged to depths of 19 m and capable of taking vessels with maximum drafts up to 17,5 m.
One of the numerous spin-offs of this is that tourism in Richards Bay and the adjacent wildlife and cultural/historical regions of KwaZulu Natal is benefiting because large cruise liners can berth at the port.
Sea-going tourism is a rising trend and the visit of one of these ocean liners is a boost for the local economy. Twelve ocean liners visited Richards Bay in 2001 and that number had already been reached by September this year.
Developments under consideration for Richards Bay as a result of this business are construction of a dedicated passenger terminal and further expansion of the existing Tuzi Gazi Waterfront.
Despite its image as a bustling commercial port and hub of a heavily industrialised growth zone, Richards Bay is close to a number of SA's main ecotourist attractions.
The St Lucia estuary is just 80 km north of Richards Bay and is the start of the Greater St Lucia Wetland, which is a World Heritage Site.
Richards Bay is also just 70 km from the Hluhluwe-Umfolosi park complex run by KwaZulu Natal Wildlife, which is the premier big-game viewing destination in the province.
In addition to the proposed passenger terminal and dry-dock there are a number of other possible developments being considered for the port, including a container-handling facility.
At least three proposals are being considered to set up additional coal export facilities through Richards Bay separate from the existing RBCT.
One is to use existing facilities in the Dry Bulk Terminal. A second involves a consortium called Simunye Port Holdings.
Simunye's proposal is to set up a coal stockyard just outside the harbour perimeter near the Dry Bulk Terminal and transport the coal on a conveyor belt to the harbour.
A third possibility is to resurrect the proposed site for the South Dunes Coal Terminal adjacent the RBCT. RBCT MD Nigel Stevens says he would support construction of a separate, small terminal user at Richards Bay, if the demand was there to justify it.
