Port of Houston welcomes ZIM service connecting the east coast of South America with the Gulf of Mexico and the US.

The Port of Houston welcomed ZIM's 'Gulf Toucan' service, which arrived at the Barbours Cut Container Terminal on February 5. This service is a premium line from the east coast of South America to the Gulf of Mexico and the United States that includes eight 2,800 TEU vessels.

The 'Gulf Toucan' service will call at: Buenos Aires - Montevideo - Navegantes or Itapoa - Paranagua - Santos - Río De Janeiro - Cartagena - Kingston - Veracruz - Altamira - Houston - Mobile - Kingston - Cartagena - Santos - Buenos Aires.

“We are delighted to welcome ZIM Shipping Company’s new ‘Gulf Toucan’ service to the Port of Houston,” said Roger Guenther, CEO of the Port of Houston. "This new service highlights the significant investments we have made in the Port's infrastructure to increase capacity, as well as our continued growth in the Latin American trade. Indeed, trade in containerized goods between Port Houston and Latin America has increased 33% in the last five years."

For his part, Daniel Sutton, SVP Gulf Pacific, ZIM Integrated Shipping Services Ltd, said: "We are very pleased to introduce a new service to Latin America from the US Gulf owned and operated exclusively by ZIM Integrated Shipping. The service ZGT continues our expanded Latin American network and will provide excellent sailing times from Houston on the east coast of South America and will also serve our customers in Central America, the Caribbean and the west coast of South America through connections with "Our network in Kingston, Jamaica and Cartagena, Colombia. We look forward to working with Port Houston and new and existing customers to make this new service a success."