The Grindrod Maputo car terminal spanning an area of 34 757 m² came in to operation a month ahead of schedule in November 2007. With an initial capacity to park about 1 455 cars and an annual throughput capacity of 52 000 cars (based on a 6 day dwell time), the terminal offers an immediate solution to complement the South African car terminals operating under severe capacity constraints. Maputo is ideally situated to serve as a complementary port for the import and export of vehicles delivering to, or manufactured in Gauteng.
The agreement to lease the car terminal for a 25 year period, with the option to extend for a further 10 years, was reached with MPDC and the Government of Mozambique. Further to this, Grindrod was to develop phase 1 (now complete), and at a later date phases 2 and 3 increasing the throughput capacity to 250 000 cars per annum.
A secondary market will focus on the second hand import car market to service other African countries and the transshipment of vehicles for the Eastern seaboard.