Eduardo Nery states that the country exploits less than 20,000 km of the 64,000 km of navigable waterways identified by the municipality
The general director of Antaq (National Waterway Transport Agency), Eduardo Nery, stated this Tuesday (September 19, 2023) that Brazil exploits less than half of its waterway potential. According to Nery, the SNV (National Transport System) records 42,000 km of navigable rivers in the country, but less than 20,000 km are actually used to transport cargo and passengers.
The underutilization of Brazilian rivers becomes even greater if we consider a study carried out by an Antaq working group in 2011 that identified a potential of 64,000 km of navigable waterways. According to this assessment, Brazil uses 29.7% of its potential in this mode of transport.
“We identified that a little more than 19,000 km of our waterways are in fact explored, that is, we are exploring around a third of our waterway potential”said Nery at a meeting of the Road and Transport committee of the Chamber of Deputies.
In 2022, Brazil recorded around 40 million tons moved in inland navigation. The number was a record for the sector, but it still highlights the low exploitation of the waterway sector.
According to Nery, when considering vessels that use long-distance waterways (navigation mode with calls at ports in more than one country), this number reaches 100 million tons.
To exemplify the wasted potential in Brazilian waterways, the director of the municipality used as an example the Mississippi River, in the United States, which alone transports 4 times more than all the rivers in the national territory.
Among Brazil’s main waterways, 9 are responsible for around 63% of this amount of 100 million tons. See the list below:
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