Dredging International NV

Together with Baggerwerken Decloedt, Dredging International is one of the primary operating companies of DEME Group, responsible for more than two thirds of total turnover. Dredging International (DI) has a leading position on the global dredging market and has experienced rapid and sustained growth over the last decade. The core activity of DI is dredging and land reclamation.

Dredging International has its roots in the world port of Antwerp on the river Scheldt. We are proud to have contributed for more than one hundred years to deepening and maintenance programs of the river fairway, and to major reclamation projects that have created new land for a world class industry. In one century, the depth of the river fairway has more than doubled and bulk carriers of up to 274.726 dwt and a length of 335 metres are now able to sail seventy kilometers inland. After the First World War barely 425.000 m3 per year was dredged in the river Scheldt. By contrast, since the end of the Second World War, almost half a billion m3 of spoil has been removed from the Scheldt. At the same time, the port has expanded to 14.000 ha on the left and the right river banks. We are proud to have participated to this impressive achievement.

The knowledge, the experience and the skills we have acquired on our primary home market is made available for clients abroad. For more than a century, constituting companies of DI have worked in all corners of the world. At the turn of the 19th to the 20th century, our engineers were building the inland grain harbours in Argentina; in the 1920’s they were constructing quay walls on the Mekong river in Southeast Asia. In the 1970’s we built the modern ports in the Persian Gulf and the Red Sea.

Today, our modern and high-tech trailing suction hopper dredgers and the mighty cutter suction dredgers are deepening fairways and reclaiming new land in South America, in Singapore, in Australia, in Africa and all over Europe. DI is taking the lead in the construction of France’s Port 2000 at Le Havre, we are building ports in India, we are involved in the huge Jurong & Tuas land reclamation project in Singapore, and we are keeping the Martin Garcia channels to depth in Rio de la Plata on the border of Argentina and Uruguay