Ministry of Transport, Information Technology and Communications

We are investing nearly 4 million lev to build two Coastal Stations for monitoring of the ship traffic in Varna and Burgas. That was said by the Minister of Transport, Information Technology and Communications, Danail Papazov, during the official construction start of the site in Varna. The event was also attended by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Kristian Vigenin, the Chairman of the Regional Policy and Local Self-Government Committee in the National Assembly, Borislav Gutsanov, the governor of Varna, Ivan Velikov, the Mayor of Varna, Ivan Portnih, the Director General of National Company "Port Infrastructure", Angel Zaburtov, representatives of the maritime community and others.

"After the last record breaking year for the Port of Varna, the first quarter of this year once again gives us reason to be optimistic," said Danail Papazov. According to him, by mid April, the company has handled around 2.5 million tons of cargo, which is more than 2% higher than the performance in the same period of the previous year.

“The results show that any investment in the port of Varna is worth it”, stated the Minister and also added that currently there is a project for restoring the projected depths of the port of Varna and upgrading of the port equipment that is ongoing.

The construction of the two coastal centres should be completed by the end of this year. They are part of the third Lot of the project “Vessels traffic management information system (VTMIS)” financed under OP “Transport 2007 – 2013”. The total project cost is nearly 40 million lev. After its implementation the scope and the functions of the systems will be expanded and a unified national marine information system will be provided.

In the newly built waterfront center - Varna there will be an operational center for traffic management Varna - VTS Center Varna deployed, which will manage and monitor the vessel traffic in the sea areas, as well as an operational center of the Bulgarian part of the Global Maritime Distress and Safety System - GMDSS Operating Center, and a national center for electronic document exchange in maritime transport.