International ports

Mexico is in the fast lane to become a major automotive manufacturing hub. And while the decision to move to Mexico may seem simple for automobile and auto part makers looking to cut costs and transit times, it doesn’t make managing supply chains any simpler.

APM Terminals is banking on a doubling of Costa Rica’s refrigerated container exports over the next 15 years and improvements in reefer technology to fuel its ambitious investment in the deep-sea Moin container terminal.

DP World-operated Chennai Container Terminal last week received a call from the Maersk Serangoon, reportedly the longest container ship ever to call at India’s southeastern gateway.

With a two-phase expansion of its container facilities, Mexico's top automotive gateway says it is taking aim at competitors in the U.S. such as the Port of Houston.

The Mombasa County government is trying to extract more fees from users of the Port of Mombasa at two points in the supply chain, which would further drive up shipping costs in East Africa’s largest container gateway.

The 10 ports on the JOC's list of fastest-growing leading global container ports for 2014 each achieved year-over-year throughput growth of at least 10 percent.

Shippers and ocean carriers using India’s Tuticorin Port, or V.O. Chidamabaranar, may see significant productivity improvements in the coming months, as logistics providers are introducing an automated system for the movement of containers to and from the harbor.

There was no let up for Hong Kong in the month of September as container volumes fell for the 15th consecutive month.

Container traffic at Ukrainian ports is steadily declining, reversing a previous trend of 11 to 13 percent annual growth.

The government of India on Wednesday approved extending an earlier productivity-linked incentive scheme for port and dockworkers through the current fiscal year, which ends March 31, 2016, averting potential labor stoppages at major public ports.

Rotterdam’s container volume increased just 1 percent in the first nine months of the year due to lower Chinese exports, the deteriorating Russian economy and slowing growth in emerging economies such as Brazil.

China’s land and maritime transport initiative linking Asia with Europe and Africa, and the countries in between, promises to add up to $2.5 trillion in trade to the country over the next decade, a Kuehne + Nagle executive said Thursday.

Antwerp’s container traffic grew 8 percent in the first nine months of the year as the Belgian port boosted traffic on the troubled Asia-Europe route.

The Russian government will begin work on a new deep-sea port in the enclave of Kaliningrad, between Poland and Lithuania on the Baltic Sea, by the end of the year.

Privately-operated Mundra Port recorded double-digit container throughput growth in the first fiscal half, driven in part by diversions from Jawaharlal Nehru Port disruptions and congestion that dragged down volumes at India’s largest public container handler during the same period.

A Tokyo-based research firm has significantly downgraded its outlook for the Japanese container trade in fiscal 2015, predicting a 1.3 percent contraction compared to its previous forecast of 2 percent growth.

Brazilian port and trade associations have won an extension of a policy allowing terminal operators to import equipment with little to no tax.

Singapore’s Ministry of Transport and terminal operator PSA Corporation are planning to develop a container truck system that will boost port productivity by increasing the flow of boxes within the port and across the city-state’s streets.

APM Terminals has signed a contract for four ship-to-shore gantry cranes and 14 automated rail-mounted gantry cranes for its Vado container terminal under construction on Italy’s north-west Ligurian coast.

Efforts to merge Brazil’s Special Ports Ministry (SEP) with the Ministry of Transport seem to have been put on hold, at least temporarily, with the appointment of Helder Barbalho as the ministry’s new leader.

Kazakhstan Railways, the national railway company of Kazakhstan, will build a 1 million 20-foot-equivalent unit container terminal in Klaipeda, Lithuania, home to one of the largest Baltic seaports.

The government of India this week approved an infrastructure upgrade project at the major public port of Paradip, allowing the country’s second-largest general cargo handler to expand capacity and improve operational efficiency.

The Incheon Port Authority has doubled the size of the ships it can handle in the last decade and is working to handle even larger vessels as it continues to invest in an effort to lower costs for shippers and become a regional hub.

China has begun safety inspections of companies handling dangerous goods in the vicinity of Tianjin Port, the world’s 10th busiest container port, as supply chains adjust to the changes wrought by deadly explosions in August.

Swedish furniture maker IKEA has decided it will make Incheon port its primary South Korean gateway after it began testing out Incheon New Port Phase 1-1 container pier (Terminal B) in July.

The privatization of the port of Piraeus has been delayed as Greece’s snap general election Sept. 20 interrupted preparations by government transport and finance officials.

The volume handled at India’s major public ports grew a meager 2 percent in the first fiscal half amid sluggish global trade demand and growing service bottlenecks at some of the country’s main container gateways, particularly Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust.

The oldest container terminal in Rotterdam, ECT City Terminal, has closed after nearly fifty years, because it can’t handle the ever-larger vessels calling at Europe’s top container port.

Indian Shipping Minister Nitin Gadkari said the government plans to spend roughly Rs. 70,000 crore (approximately $10.7 billion) on upgrades for major public ports under the “Sagar Mala” project over the next five years.

Container volumes at Panama’s ports totalled just over 4 million 20-foot-equivalent units during the first seven months of this year, up by 4.4 percent from the same period last year.

The fast-growing port of Tauranga has begun widening and deepening its shipping channels to handle larger vessels after a more than four-year court battle over the project.

All but one of Japan’s five biggest ports saw their international container traffic shrink in the first half of this year amid growing economic uncertainty both at home and abroad.

Santos Brasil by 2047 plans to invest $324.4 million to allow the Tecon Santos terminal to handle larger ships and boost capacity by one-fifth after South America’s biggest container terminal operator received a 25-year concession extension at the busiest container gateway in Latin America.

When the expanded Panama Canal debuts, assumedly by mid-2016, not all Caribbean transshipment hubs will be in the same position to accommodate larger vessels, and none may be as disadvantaged as Kingston Container Terminal.

Protesting dock workers brought parts of the Brazilian port city of Santos to a standstill yesterday after the Ecoporto Santos container terminal laid off 200 workers and set out plans to sack another 200 as it fights to stay competitive in the oversaturated container terminal sector of South America’s biggest port.

The Indian government approved allocating Rs. 468 crore (approximately $72 million) to set up basic infrastructure for the long-awaited special economic zone at Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust, allowing the country's largest container handler to begin construction on a project that is designed to help drive up its cargo volumes.

Vietnam reached a framework deal with the European Union on a free trade agreement in August, increasing pressure on Hanoi to streamline the country’s logistics costs.

Unifor, the union representing owner-operator truck drivers at Port Metro Vancouver, has filed suit in federal court charging that Canada’s largest port is enforcing a clean-truck requirement that will cost each of its members thousands of dollars, while at the same time allowing terminal operators to use cargo-handling equipment that emits harmful pollutants.

Israel is hoping that a $2 billion port expansion drive, involving construction of two major container terminals at the ports of Haifa and Ashdod, will help it stave off a trade capacity crunch.

Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust, India’s biggest container handler, is increasing intermodal train deployments and rolling out more proactive measures in an effort to alleviate the backlog of containerized freight built up during the past few weeks.