The 80-hectare inland clearance depot has been developed at a total investment of some US$60 million and has an annual throughput of 500,000 twenty-foot-equivalent units (TEUs), or about 10 million tons of cargo.

The depot is comprised of a container yard of 23 hectares, warehouses of all kinds on an area of 50 hectares, and offices and service area over seven hectares, said Pham Van Long, director of Tan Cang- Long Binh ICD Joint Stock Company. He said Tan Cang –Long Binh ICD would be the first ICD in Vietnam applying E-customs procedures.

The new ICD offers easy traffic access, he said. “The new ICD is accessible to national highways No. 1 and No. 51, to the ports along the Dong Nai River and to Binh Duong Province by waterway as well as to the national railway. The ICD and other facilities have created a perfect logistic network available for the receipt and delivery of cargoes in HCMC, Dong Nai, Binh Duong and Ba Ria-Vung Tau provinces,” he said.

The ICD will help meet a recent surge in demand, especially when deepwater seaports in the Thi Vai-Cai Mep area in Baria-Vung Tau have started operation since June 2009.

Many international shipping lines have plans to transport import-export cargo directly form Vietnam to the U.S. or Europe instead of going through other transshipment hubs in Singapore, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Korea. Therefore big shipping lines such as Maersk, APL, MOL, and Hanjin have huge demands for logistics services, and the new ICD will be there to meet such demand.

Nguyen Van Hien, chairman of Saigon Newport Company, said the new ICD would become an important logistics center to provide strong support for terminal operations at Tan Cang–Cat Lai Terminal and Tan Cang–Cai Mep Terminals. It would also serve as a big clearance point for imports-exports of Dong Nai Province, Hien said.

Saigon Newport is now operating as a holding company with nine subsidiaries, five enterprises, and one operation center.

Apart from Tan Cang – Long Binh ICD, Saigon Newport is operating Tan Cang Terminal and Tan Cang–Cat Lai Terminal in HCMC, Tan Cang–Cai Mep Deep sea Container Terminal in Ba Ria–Vung Tau Province, Tan Cang–Song Than ICD in Binh Duong Province, and Tan Cang – Nhon Trach Depot in Dong Nai Province.

With modern handling equipment and state-of-the-art management technology, Tan Cang – Cat Lai Terminal has emerged as the leading container terminal in Vietnam. In the first half of 2009, the terminal handled more than 1.1 million TEUs or 15 million tons, accounting for more than 79% of the total container throughput in HCMC area and almost 50% of the national figure.