Freezone Sohar attracts international investor interest - International investors are keenly eyeing opportunities to set up operations at Freezone Sohar (FzS), an ambitious free zone venture taking shape alongside the Port of Sohar.

The project, according to Jamal T Aziz, Deputy CEO of Sohar Industrial Port Company (SIPC) and Chief Operating Officer of Freezone Sohar, has attracted strong investor interest since it opened for business last year.

“Numerous investors from different parts of the world have expressed their keenness to invest in Sohar. Some proposals are in advanced stages of negotiations,” Jamal Aziz said while speaking at a New Year’s reception hosted by Maqbool bin Ali Sultan, Minister of Commerce and Industry and Chairman of SIPC, at Grand Hyatt Muscat on Sunday.

Present at the event were a number of government dignitaries and top executives of firms representing various industrial and infrastructure investments at the Port of Sohar, as well as service providers, shipping agencies and other companies that together make up the port user community at Sohar.

In a brief presentation on Freezone Sohar, Jamal Aziz underlined the enormous investment appeal of the venture, given its proximity to a world-class port. Investors also stand to benefit from the planned establishment of an international airport and rail network, in other to other transport infrastructure in the Batinah region. Freezone Sohar aims to attract downstream investments that add value to base industries, chiefly petrochemicals and metals, currently in operation at the Port of Sohar next door.

A proposed network of dedicated corridors will allow for the easy movement of containerised traffic, petrochemicals, and other products, while plans are afoot to connect the free zone to the airport and rail terminal in the future, he said. To help woo investors, the authority has drawn up an attractive regulatory regime and a range of fiscal incentives that will be enshrined in a new statute, the Sohar Free Zone Law, due to promulgated soon.

Of the 4,500-hectares earmarked for the mammoth venture, a 500-hectare plot has been taken in hand for development in the first phase. And in a sign of the project’s promising investor appeal, FzS has already welcomed its first tenant. Oilfield Warehouse & Services LLC (OWS), an Indian-Omani joint venture specialising in logistics and material management for the oil and gas industry, commenced operations from a site within the complex last October. Special concessionary tariffs are being offered to investors who sign up before May 1, 2010. A One-Stop-Shop facility has also been set up within FzS’s Customers Services Department to undertake to expeditious processing of permits and approvals.

Freezone Sohar is being developed by Sohar International Development Company (SIDC), a 50:50 joint venture between the Government of Oman and Port of Rotterdam, and SKIL Infrastructure Limited of India. The free zone authority is in the process of appointing a consultant to undertake detailed design and engineering studies for Phase 1, which is targeted to be brought into operation before the end of this year.