The first thing Qatar did after it was subjected to an illegal siege was to open up shipping routes to different parts of the world in order to ensure the country’s food security.

The expansion has continued unabated, to newer ports around the globe, with the newest being the Umm Qasr Port in Iraq, reported Gulf Times.

Milaha, the Doha-based maritime transport and logistics conglomerate, launched the direct container feeder service between Qatar and Iraq yesterday.

The first vessel in the new service is set to depart from the Hamad Port on May 7 and will reach Umm Qasr Port on May 9, reported The Peninsula.

The new service will be initially served by one vessel with a 1,015 TEU capacity and 110 reefer plugs and will have a transit time of two days, making it particularly ideal for dry and refrigerated food stuff, consumer electronics, and construction materials, among other cargo.

The new service will be an expansion of the existing Qatar-Kuwait service that the company launched last year. It will follow a Hamad Port-Umm Qasr-Shuwaikh (Kuwait)-Hamad Port rotation.

“There has been an excellent demand on the Qatar-Kuwait service that we launched last year, and we’ve been looking at ways to further expand that service to give our Iraqi clients and partners more convenience through greater port coverage and reduced transit times,” Milaha’s President and CEO Abdulrahman Essa Al Mannai said.

“This new service will contribute to the reconstruction efforts in Iraq, and will also help boost the growing trade and economic relations between Qatar and Iraq,” he added.

Since last year, Milaha has expanded into several new shipping routes and accelerated deployment of new supply chain solutions across a number of countries. 

Milaha currently calls two ports in Oman (Sohar and Salalah), three ports in India (Nhava Sheva, Mundra, and Kandla), one port in Kuwait (Shuwaikh), one port in Pakistan (Karachi), one port in Sri Lanka (Colombo), and one port in Bangladesh (Chittagong), offering enhanced connectivity and transit times to Qatar and the region.