Pakistan’s Port Qasim has begun a major capital dredging programme after a sharp rise in transshipment volumes, officials said.
Sources indicated on 28 August 2026 that authorities at Pakistan’s second-largest seaport are deepening and widening a 49-kilometre navigational channel under a $250 million project to allow larger vessels to call.
The Port Qasim Authority has described the work as a capital dredging scheme designed to alter channel dimensions so the port can handle larger ship types, the report added.
Officials cited a more than fourfold surge in transshipment across Pakistan’s ports as the immediate driver of the investment, saying the increase has changed local cargo flows.
The report states that the PQA has handled 20,000 twenty-foot equivalent units, or TEUs, during the recent period of elevated activity.
Project scale and aims
The dredging covers a 49-kilometre navigation channel and is budgeted at $250 million, the account noted, with the stated purpose of accommodating larger vessels and altering the port’s capability profile.
Details released to the press emphasised capital expenditure and channel modification rather than ancillary works, underlining the port authority’s focus on navigational depth and width.
Transshipment surge and operational impact
The port authority linked the dredging directly to a more than fourfold rise in transshipment at the country’s ports, presenting the investment as a response to shifting shipping patterns in the wider Gulf and region.
reports’s report frames the Qasim works as timely, following the spike in container volumes that the PQA quantified at 20,000 TEUs handled amid the uptick.
Taken together, the dredging programme and the reported transshipment increase represent a sizeable operational intervention intended to change Port Qasim’s handling profile and vessel access.
The account did not detail a construction timetable or the exact technical specifications beyond the channel length and project cost. The port authority’s announcement, as recorded by the report, concentrates on the channel works and the recent rise in transshipment as the rationale for the expenditure.