Overall and specific objectives

The overall objective of this action is to develop a resilient and sustainable connectivity between the EU and Asia, and between Asian countries, in a context of global trade expansion and energy transition. 

The specific objectives of this action are to improve safety management in the beneficiary ports of South and Southeast Asia, and to enhance incident management capacities in those ports.

The GPS project will deliver technical assistance, including workshops and training, as well as equipment to the selected target ports, and promote decarbonisation to reduce environmental impact of port operations. The GPS project aims to enhance prevention and response to dangerous goods incidents, raise awareness, and share best European practices and international standards on safety prevention and incident response in strategic industrial ports.

Project location

The project targets eight countries from which 12 post have been identified:

• Cambodia (Sihanoukville)
• Indonesia (Tanjung Priok in Jakarta and Tanjung Perak in Surabaya)
• Malaysia (Port Klang in Kuala Lumpur and Tanjung Pelepas in Johor)
• Philippines (Manila)
• Vietnam (Ho Chi Minh CIty and Haiphong)
• Bangladesh (Chittagong)
• Sri Lanka (Colombo)

Implementing partner

• Expertise France
• EU Member States involved in the GPS project are France and Poland. There are also other EU Member States and like-minded countries involved, i.e. Czech Republic, Singapore and the Republic of Korea.

Budget

• EU contribution: €6,000,000
• France is co-funding the project with €720,000

Main outputs

• Safety and awareness in decarbonised maritime fuels’ operations are enhanced by identifying and adopting best practices and international safety and environmental standards

• Dangerous goods safety management is improved by strengthening the regulatory environment and putting into practice the highest safety and environmental standards

• Capabilities and skills to manage incidents involving hazardous materials are developed within port areas;

• Large-scale man-made disasters management capabilities strengthened at a local and regional scale.