Tag: ports

Vietnam port problems laid bare The Vietnam Ports Association has spoken out to warn of substantial problems in the country's port sector.One of the key issues is the lack of dredging. The water passage to Hai Phong port, one of Vietnam's busiest, has lacked regular dredging for many years, the VPA said in a statement adding there were similar problems at Can Tho which made the ports much less effective than they should be.This is worsened by poor landside connections. Railway links have not been upgraded "for the last tens of years", said the association. "Bad roads", as it termed them, at Tien Sa port in Da Nang, Cat Lai port (among others) in the Ho Chi Minh city region and to the Ben Nghe and Thi Vai-Cai Mep port complex in Ba Ria- Vung Tau "have been hindering the development of the ports", it added.It is unusual in communist Vietnam for trade bodies to publically express their worries except behind closed door."We raised the issue of land access and deepwater access," said Ho Kim Lan, secretary general of the VPA in a phone interview with Port Strategy.More sensitive still is the issue of over-development as too many small ports ...

Spanish ports scored 5.8 out of a maximum seven points The Global Competitiveness Report 2011-2012 put together by the World Economic Forum suggests that ports in Germany, Holland, Belgium, Sweden, Finland and Denmark are among the most productive in Europe.These are followed by Spain, in seventh place, ahead of the UK, Italy and France.Surprisingly, Spanish ports scored 5.8 out of a maximum seven points.Source: Port Strategy

Ports of Europe have worked hard to break down barriers between the port and the local community Modern ports are not everyone's favourite neighbour. Once, ports were thought of as the probable raison d'être of a city's very existence, and the port and port-related industries were huge employers of large numbers of people who had a vested interest in the port's prosperity.But today, in the depopulated and automated world of modern cargo handling, there may be far smaller numbers of people directly or even indirectly dependent on ships and their terminals. And whereas there may be an audience of enthusiasts who like to see the ships come and go, many more people will regard the port on their doorstep as a nuisance. They will suggest that its operations generate vast numbers of heavy road vehicles blocking up the port approaches, while they might complain at the noise, dirt, dust and congestion from all the cargo handling that goes on. They may not even like the smells!Ships tend to work around the clock, so night will bring no remission from the noise of clanking container or ore terminals, the ship's generators will be heard and there may even be complaints of ...

A big challenge for the shipping industry Porta in united Kingdom can play a major role in reducing carbon emissions despite the fact that they are one of the least polluting links in the maritime supply chain.University of Hull has conducted a new study which found that port companies could be drivers of change in reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the industry's supply chains.The study, presented at the Low Carbon Shipping 2011 International Conference in Glasgow last week, looked at the environmental actions taking place in UK ports and compared them with initiatives abroad. Researchers mapped the activity of 72 UK port locations and compared these Activities with those carried out by leading ports overseas.The findings revealed that carbon emissions from ports and port-related activity are small compared with emissions from ships and the haulage companies that serve them.According to the study's preliminary results, in 2008, the added emissions from five large UK ports groups represented a small percentage of those generated by the ships calling at these same ports: 174,000 tonnes from port operations and approximately 10m tonnes from international shipping.In 2007, international shipping accounted for 870m tonnes of carbon, or 2.7% of global emissions, whereas international aviation accounted ...

21 operators and a similar number of vessels The Federal Transport Supervising Service (Rostransnadzor) of Russian Transport Ministry has published a list of shipping companies, whose vessels were banned from entering foreign ports for non-compliance of international conventions in 2010.Among the blacklisted shipping companies are about 21 operators and a similar number of vessels. The list is supplemented by three companies that blatantly violated the licensing terms.These are: Arkhangelsk-based Nord-Way LLC, whose ship Varnek repeatedly violated the restrictions in the Barents Sea, which resulted in the ship wreck and death of five crew members and four passengers; Yakutsk-based Lena United River Shipping Company, and MV Alexey Kulakovskiy, with 32 proved cases of violation of navigation areas rules. The vessel wrecked killing 11 crew members. Also there was an accident with the Anabar suction dredger of FSI Lena GBUVPiS (Yakutsk) in 2010 when a man died.The supervising agency reported other violations on ships of blacklisted companies, including failure to comply with fire safety measures, and requirements for life-saving boats, etc.Source: Portnews