Tim Carter and Brendan Prendergast confirming the deal that will see MOVE Logistics increase their warehousing capacity.

Canterbury‘s largest warehousing and logistics operator, MOVE Logistics (MOVE), has announced a long-term lease at IPort Business Park, a $500 million industrial and logistics park on 122 hectares of prime industrial-zoned land in Rolleston.

MOVE will lease a purpose-built warehouse which will extend its warehousing in Canterbury from 50,000sqm to 78,000sqm.

Stage 1 of the IPort development included the sale of 27 hectares to Lyttelton Port Company (LPC) in 2015 to develop its Inland Port, MidlandPort.

MOVE Logistics managing director Brendan Prendergast says they have been working with LPC as well as IPort developers the Carter Group for the past 18 months. The warehouse will be built on land adjacent to LPC‘s MidlandPort.

“MOVE Logistics has experienced huge growth over the past years, now employing more than 350 staff with 120 trucks moving freight across New Zealand. This is our second investment in inland ports as we have a warehousing facility at Wiri, Ports of Auckland‘s inland port. We see our investment in IPort complementing the Wiri service and allowing us to offer our customers an end-to-end delivery service and, at the same time, reduce freight movements.

“We are particularly pleased that the IPort warehouse facility will deliver increased efficiency and cost savings to our customers, ranging from reduced container transportation costs, container triangulation benefits, access to rail and reduced overall supply chain costs.”

Prendergast says sharing a seamless open boundary to MidlandPort will ensure their customers have direct connectivity to international markets, and LPC‘s comprehensive shipping services also mean their customers will have unmatched access to worldwide markets through the extensive range of shipping lines calling at Lyttelton Port.

“The move to IPort positions us at the centre of the growing agriculture sector. We know that agribusiness and crop diversification will be further enabled by the large public and private investment in irrigation projects such as Central Plains Water, set to increase agricultural output by $264m per year. We want to ensure we are well prepared to support this growth from a warehousing and logistics perspective.”

IPort director, Tim Carter, says IPort builds on the major investments in development and infrastructure that have already fuelled record growth in Canterbury and the wider Selwyn region, and the signing of MOVE Logistics is a welcome addition. He said about 92 percent of Canterbury‘s exports transit through Rolleston, so IPort is a natural aggregation point for road and rail connections.

“Stage 2 of the Southern Motorway extension will be completed by early 2019, making Rolleston very accessible to Christchurch‘s central city – cutting journey times from half an hour to 15 minutes.”

LPC marketing manager Simon Munt says MidlandPort supports better supply chain efficiency, particularly for Central Canterbury importers and exporters.

“Direct rail access to Lyttelton Port‘s waterside operation is a unique feature of the MidlandPort service. This will provide MOVE‘s customers with efficiencies and cost savings by reducing container handling via LPC‘s direct rail link into Lyttelton Port. The rail line has removed a significant number of trucks a day from Christchurch roads, which ultimately benefits the environment.”