A Mount Isa Townsville Economic Zone members’ meeting in Mount Isa on Friday has called on governments to stop arguing and make vital investment decisions for Mount Isa to Townsville supply-chain infrastructure.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
Responding to the current port rail infrastructure funding impasse, MITEZ President David Glasson said they wanted state and federal Governments to get together and sort out the funding arrangements.
Mr Glasson said the region’s economic potential was being stymied by a lack of coordinated infrastructure planning and investment.
“There is no better example than the current impasse for the funding of the Townsville Eastern Access Rail Corridor and the Port Channel Widening project,” Mr Glasson said.
“The Mount Isa to Townsville region contributes more than $20 billion annually to the national accounts, and with more than $10 billion in trade passing through it annually, the Port of Townsville supply chain is a freight corridor of national importance.”
Mr Glasson said vital strategic upgrades such as the TEARC and the channel widening projects were critical enablers of private sector investment in one of the world’s richest minerals and agricultural precincts.
“Industry needs a globally, competitive supply chain if it is to make the most of the opportunities flowing from high economic growth in the Indo-pacific region,” he said.
“The rich mineral resources of the Mount Isa and Cloncurry Region is acknowledged as being of global significance and the supply corridor servicing it, the lifeblood of our region. We need to provide efficient access to and from the port.”
Mr. Glasson said the Federal Government needed to contribute $75 million to the Channel widening project in the coming budget and that the State Government to prioritise the planning and corridor acquisition needed to facilitate the timely development of TEARC.
Several MITEZ industry members said that for them to remain competitive commodity producers in the world market, the access charges to supply chain infrastructure needed to become less expensive.
Mr Glasson said Government needed to re-evaluate its formula for their access charges for infrastructure to be an “enabler of economic development” rather than a “çash-cow” for Treasury.
“This would see new mines open up in the North West that would in turn create more investment, jobs, payroll taxes and mineral royalties for the State,” he said.
“Also, there would be fewer trucks on the roads as freight returned to the rail.”
Derek Barry
Editor of the North West Star Mount Isa since January 2016. Prior to that, an editor at several regional southern Queensland newspapers. Passionate about telling local stories. Comes with a strange accent to due an Irish accident of birth.
Editor of the North West Star Mount Isa since January 2016. Prior to that, an editor at several regional southern Queensland newspapers. Passionate about telling local stories. Comes with a strange accent to due an Irish accident of birth.
