Bahri Chemicals inks charter deal for 9 UACC chemical tankers

Saudi Arabia’s national shipping carrier Bahri said that its business unit Bahri Chemicals has concluded a long-term time charter deal with Dubai-headquartered United Arab Chemical Carriers Limited (UACC).

As part of the deal, nine UACC IMO2 medium range (MR) chemical tankers will join Bahri Chemicals’ fleet from April 2021 onward, bringing the total number of vessels of the same class that it operates to 31.

“This transaction is a testament to the resilience of Bahri Chemicals’ business and operations and represents the normal progression of our long-term strategy implementation. The addition of the vessels further underscores that we are well on track to achieve our fleet expansion plans and is closely tied to our ongoing newbuilding program,” Eng. Abdullah Aldubaikhi, CEO of Bahri, said.

Namely, Bahri Chemicals has 10 advanced, eco-design, wide-beam IMO2 MR tankers under construction at Hyundai Mipo Dockyard in South Korea with delivery scheduled for 2022.

Bahri Chemicals currently owns a fleet of 23 chemical tankers, including 22 IMO2 MRs and one IMO2 LR, as well as five product tankers providing maritime transportation to a customer base across chemicals, clean petroleum products, and vegetable oils industries.

Bahri reported a whopping increase of 153 percent in annual net profit for the fourth quarter of 2020 from SAR 621 million ($ 165.5 million) in 2019 to SAR 1.6 billion in a year marred by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Revenue rose by 28 percent to SAR 8.4 billion, as compared to SAR 6.6 billion recorded for the previous year.

The remarkable growth in earnings was attributed to the strong performance of Bahri’s business units despite the challenges of the year.