Credit: DP World Dakar Port
Congestion along West Africa’s coast is exposing infrastructure that appears dramatically ill-suited to the region’s rapidly developing container market, with concerns that the level of investment, and its intended developments, are not where they need to be.
Last year, Drewry recorded a 19.4% year-on-year upturn in regional container throughput, reflecting the introduction of larger vessels on Asia-West Africa services, and The Loadstar’s reporting indicates developing trade between West Africa and Latin America.
Eirik Hooper, Drewry’s ports and terminals specialist, told The Loadstar: “The congestion appears to be the result of a mismatch between rapidly expanding vessel capacity, growing volumes and the ability of terminals and supporting logistics systems to process that cargo.”
He believes the source of this pressure is linked to introduction of 24,000 teu vessels on MSC’s Africa Express service, which began last April, and by May was calling at Lomé, Tema, Abidjan, and Kribi, although he warned problems vary considerably across ports.
According to Drewry, Doula operated last year at 102% utilisation, with volumes rising 48% year on year, while Conakry, Dakar, Lomé, and Pointe-Noire hovered between 81% and 84%. But pointing to Tema, Mr Hooper said simply seeing this as a terminal issue would not help.
The Ghanaian gateway experienced congestion of between four and seven days during the summer peak and is still hovering around the six-day mark, despite the country’s transport minister noting there had been significant improvements in terminal capacity this year.
But Mr Hooper said this came “without corresponding improvements to its supporting transport infrastructure”, adding: “The Ghana Ports and Harbours Authority had already identified imports, empty containers and road congestion as principal contributors to delays.
“Consequently, it would be misleading to characterise Tema’s problems simply as a lack of terminal investment. The evidence instead points towards a mismatch between the scale of investment inside the terminal and investment outside it.
“Landside bottlenecks often determine effective terminal capacity meaning slow container evacuation, truck shortages, customs delays and inadequate off-dock storage contribute to high yard occupancy, reducing waterside productivity.”
Similar examples can be found; investment at Abidjan in additional yard equipment in 2025, did little to prevent average vessel wait times jumping from 0.4 days in February to 2.2 days by end of August, while Douala exceeding its handling capacity means it needs more.
“There are then two fundamentally different situations, modern terminals with insufficient hinterland connectivity versus terminals facing genuine operational constraints West African port congestion exposes gaps in infrastructure investment,” Mr Hooper added.
DP World chief executive and managing director for Africa, Mohammed Akoojee, seems to see a relatively obvious solution: combining terminal expansion with investment across the wider African supply chain.
Mr Akoojee told The Loadstar: “Addressing these challenges requires more than expanding terminals. Investment in modern equipment, deeper berths, roads, rail and inland logistics networks must go hand in hand to ensure cargo moves efficiently through the supply chain.”
For its part, DP World has invested $340m in modernising its Dakar terminal, increasing throughput from 265,000 teu in 2008 to 850,000 teu in 2025, with the operator noting that this has seen vessel wait times plummet from 35 hours to near zero.
However, he said that “even highly productive terminals” eventually encountered physical constraints, with this particularly true in cases where opportunities for further expansion are limited.
“Our $1.2bn investment in the new deepwater port of Ndayane builds on this progress, providing capacity for larger vessels and future trade growth. Ndayane will have an initial annual container-handling capacity of 1.2m teu in the first phase,” Mr Akoojee said.
This project forms part of a wider wave of port development across the region, including new terminals at Pointe-Noire, Banana, in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and projects in Nigeria, alongside expansions at San Pedro in Ivory Coast, Takoradi in Ghana, and Luanda.
“With African trade expected to grow and shipping evolving, continued integrated investment in port and logistics infrastructure are essential; needs vary by market, but our focus remains developing capacity, improving efficiency and strengthening inland connectivity,” he added.