By Elida Moreno

PANAMA CITY, Feb 3 (Reuters) – After greater than a year-long delay, a brand new set of bigger locks for the Panama Canal can be full by the top of June, the waterway’s administrator stated on Wednesday, after builders repaired cracks that had shaped within the concrete partitions.

The consortium constructing a 3rd, greater set of locks on one of many world’s busiest maritime routes, headed by Italy’s Salini Impregilo and Spain’s Sacyr, is now in testing, the ultimate step earlier than the mission’s inauguration, stated Jorge Quijano, who leads the Panama Canal Authority.

Panama ought to begin to profit from the enlargement in 2017, when the federal government foresees getting $1.4 billion in income, a leap of 30 p.c in comparison with this fiscal yr.

The mission was initially set to be completed on the finish of 2014, however the date was pushed again to April of this yr as a consequence of a dispute between the administrator and the constructing consortium over prices. The plan was initially set at $5.25 billion, however the builders efficiently argued for an additional $3.2 billion, of which the canal authority has paid $250 million up to now.

Quijano informed Reuters final yr that he was now setting his sights on an much more formidable mission value as much as $17 billion that will enable the waterway to deal with the world’s largest ships, by way of one more even bigger set of locks. (Reporting by Elida Moreno, writing by Enrique Andres Pretel and Anna Yukhananov; Editing by Lisa Shumaker)

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