Egypt’s Suez Canal earned revenue of $3 billion in the first six months of 2021, canal authority official revealed on Sunday.
The record is up 8.8 percent compared with the same period last year, Osama Rabie, the canal authority chairman noted.
The canal authority will receive a tug boat with a pulling capacity of about 75 tons as part of a settlement to release the container ship Ever Given, which blocked traffic at the waterway for six days in March, Rabie told a private TV channel.
Egypt lost between $12 million and $15 million in revenues for each day the waterway was closed, according to the Suez Canal Authority.
Egypt retained the vessel seeking compensation from Japanese firm Shoei Kisen Kaisha for lost canal revenues and the cost of salvaging it and for damage to the shipping lane that links Asia and Europe.
Last week, Rabie said Egypt had signed a non-disclosure agreement with the owners of the Ever Given as it finalized the compensation agreement.
Initially, Egypt had sought hundreds of millions of dollars in compensation but it later slashed its initial claim of $900 million to $550 million.
The Suez Canal earned Egypt just over $5.7 billion in the 2019/20 fiscal year, according to official figures -- little changed from the $5.3 billion earned back in 2014.
