International ports

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.

The fast-growing port of Dar es Salaam is working to double its annual capacity to 30 million metric tons per year and reduce dwell times from nine days to five by 2020, in an effort to become the top gateway to landlocked East African countries.

Strikes and slowdowns by Brazil’s customs officers are creating serious delays for chicken exporters in Brazil, according to the Brazilian Association for Animal Protein (ABPA).

The Russian government plans to spend between 20 and 25 billion rubles ($400 to $500 million) to expand and deepen the harbor of the Novorossiysk seaport to handle larger vessels, in order to make it more competitive with Ukrainian ports also on the Black Sea.

The DP World Caucedo transshipment hub in the Dominican Republic is moving forward with upgrades to accommodate the larger vessels that will be able to traverse the expanded Panama Canal next year and provide shippers with more warehouse capacity.

The Indian federal government is retreating from a controversial “corporatization” plan to transform ‘major’, or public, port trusts into independent companies following stiff opposition from labor unions and some political groups, dealing a big blow to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s reform efforts to stimulate trade and economic growth.

A university professor thinks he may have found a solution for saving a project to dredge the channel into the port of Santos to 17 meters, or 56 feet, and also the town’s prestigious beaches from erosion as a result of that dredging.

The long-stalled Phase 2-4 of the Busan New Port is getting back in motion with the submission of applications to begin reclamation works, South Korea's Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries (MOF) announced Thursday.

Shippers using Port Botany and reeling from the impacts of labor strife in August took another blow as the facility was shut down Wednesday due to wild weather.

As a concession to the owners of the established port terminals and to encourage them to invest more in their container terminals, Brazil’s Special Ports Ministry has been negotiating to extend the concession periods before the contracts require.

India’s Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust, which has been hit hard by a series of labor and other disruptions in the past few months, is turning things around with more intermodal services and the introduction of other proactive steps.

The Federation of Ship Agents’ Association of India, representing ocean carrier agents, claims APM Terminals-operated Gateway Terminals India may be violating its concession contract with the port authority, causing off-and-on labor disruptions at Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust, India’s biggest container gateway.

In a followup to its earlier directives, India’s biggest container handler, Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust, has set Dec. 31 as the date by which shipping lines and related stakeholders should set up a paperless system for issuing import delivery orders to cargo interests.

Mokpo port has chosen South Korean logistics companies CJ Korea Express and Dongbang Co., along with port operator Mokpo New Port, to operate a vehicle terminal completed in July, according to the Mokpo Regional Oceans and Fisheries Administration Office.

Mediterranean Shipping Co. has acquired a 45 percent stake in the Trieste Marine Terminal as the 2M Alliance positions itself to capitalize on a European Union infrastructure initiative known as the TEN-T.

China, Japan, and South Korea are expanding an initiative aimed at sharing information, particularly warnings of danger, following the deadly explosions that rocked Tianjin port last month.

Volume-based toll reductions for container lines that regularly deploy large vessels through the expanded Panama Canal will make the canal route from Northeast Asia to the U.S. East Coast highly competitive with West Coast and Suez Canal routings, a Panama Canal Authority executive said.

Shippers moving good through the rapidly-growing port of Mombasa may soon have to pay steep new fees if the governor of the port’s county has his way, a move that could shift cargo to rival Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.

The Brazilian port of Sepetiba Tecon expects to double its container throughput in the second half of 2015 and should top 300,000 twenty-foot-equivalent units by year’s end.

Emirates Shipping Line has added a direct port call at Laem Chabang, Thailand to its Asia-Tanzania Express, or ATX, service, as the Middle East carrier seeks to capitalize on growing trade volumes to East Africa.

Finland ports, already suffering from container traffic declines, are set to get hit with another blow when they shut down Sept. 18 as part of a protest by the country's three big trade union federations against the government's labor reform program.

Port productivity and the ability to handle mega-ships are key drivers for shipping lines in selecting routes and ports of call and German ports must adapt to this new reality if they are to remain competitive.

DP World-operated Vallarpadam International Container Terminal at India’s Port of Cochin received long-awaited regulatory approval to reduce the number of free days allotted to laden import containers in an effort to ease congestion and improve terminal productivity.

Container throughput at China’s port of Tianjin, the world’s 10th busiest, plunged 28 percent year-over-year in August as recovery and clean-up efforts from last month’s deadly explosion continue.

Stakeholders striving to keep Brazil’s government from integrating the Special Ports Ministry, or SEP, with the Ministry of Transport have gained a powerful ally in Murillo Barbosa, head of the Association of Private Terminals.

North European ports must invest in more automated ship-to-shore cranes to achieve the 6,000 daily lifts that container lines want for their biggest ships, says Netherlands-based consulting firm Dynamar.

As container volume rises, Indonesia’s Tanjung Perak is working to improve productivity by streamlining its management, deploying new cranes and automating its operating system.

The Indian government has announced it is considering the establishment of a number of small ports, private ports for coastal shipping, taking another step toward improving supply chain services that have taken a hit in recent years amid port infrastructure bottlenecks and growing cargo volumes.

Container volume through port Gdansk plunged 16.7 percent year-over-year in the first half, highlighting the broader decline in trade between Poland and Russia as the latter’s economy struggles.

A long-running legal dispute between the Santos port authority and Grupo Libra over unpaid fees is coming to an end, paving the way for the terminal operator to invest $195.3 million in its two facilities at the busiest Latin American container gateway.