The Port of Tema has been significantly transformed by the Tema Port Expansion Project, a Build, Operate and Transfer (BoT) Project between Ghana Ports and Harbours Authority and Meridian Port Services Ltd. With the completion and operationalization of the 1^st phase and the commencement of the 2^nd Phase of the Project, there has been a significant increase in the capacity of the Port of Tema with Four (4) New Berths at Terminal 3 offering the opportunity for vessels with a draft of up to 16 meters berthing at Terminal 3.

The 24 hours services rendered at Terminal, 3 backed by the well-organized Truck Appointment System (TAS) have significantly enhanced the ease of doing business in Terminal 3 and further boosted the efficiency and image of the Port of Tema.

Security of transactions at Terminal 3 has been reinforced by the introduction of E-Invoicing, E-Payments, Access Control Systems, License Plate Recognition Systems, CCTV Cameras, X-Ray Scanners for both Imports and Exports, and Radio Frequency Identification Systems.

Indeed, many were those who doubted that the introduction of these systems would work in Ghana. But they have been pleasantly surprised as the stakeholders of Truckers, Customs Officials, Clearing and Forwarding Agents, Immigration Officers, among many others have all been successfully onboarded onto these systems and are using same with ease.  The integration of all these systems with the ICUMS system to enhance the Paperless Port Processes have been very successful at Terminal 3.

MPS has also handed back to GPHA the 2 berths of over 11 meters draft and a sizable yard capacity stretching over 247,000 m² of fully paved area at Terminal 2.  This has given GPHA the opportunity to transform Terminal 2 to a multi-purpose Terminal to handle deeper drafted vessels with many different kinds of cargo including general cargo vessels, bagged cargo, RoRo, dry bulk, liquid bulk etc.

Undoubtedly, the port of Tema is recognized as one of the burgeoning hubs within the West African sub-region.

In its quest to secure Tema Port as the Hub of West Africa, Meridian Port Services Ltd (MPS) continues to invest into the development of the Tema Port with additional facilities and infrastructure.

The company has commenced the construction of a Harbour Craft Jetty alongside preparations for the operationalization of the yard behind its 4^th new berth.

The Chief Executive Officer of MPS, Mr. Mohamed Samara emphasized the need for the developments being undertaken.

“We are excited to note that the Ministry of Trade has launched a National Policy Framework Plan for the Africa Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) and announced an action plan to boost Ghana’s trading prospects.

As the government focuses on its policy framework, MPS’ continued investments in the Port of Tema will complement Government’s efforts to position the Tema Port to become more competitive in the sub-region. Again, MPS anticipates an increase in volumes (both gateway and transhipment) as such, we have committed to increasing the yard storage and handling capacity to complement gearing up the 4^th New berth with the latest gantry cranes.

Moreover, the development of the jetty to provide a docking place for harbour craft at Terminal 3 will allow the Pilots and Tugboats to respond in record time upon completion of the vessel operations. It is expected that the reduction in response time will provide a better turnaround time for vessels at berthing and departure and  enhance security at Terminal 3.”

Transhipment Trade Highlights

Following a resumption in the transhipment trade with Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC) between the Far East and South America, MPS has handled a total of 16,038 TEUs discharged from 8 different vessels from the Far East and loaded on 3 different vessels to Brazil.

With the combined strength of the various departments, MPS has from 25^th June 2022 to 31^st July 2022 continuously improving productivity levels as evidenced on the transhipment vessel with a productivity in the range 125 Moves Per Hour.

The month of July also saw the unique occurrence of having 3 MSC vessels that were handled simultaneously on all the three berths.

MPS through its shareholders has since 2017 invested over 1.2 billion USD in the areas of infrastructure, technology, human resource development and other areas resulting in increased cargo volumes and positioning of the port as the most preferred in the West African sub-region.

Source & Photo : MPS

Dockworkers at UK’s largest container port have gone on strike for the first time in 30 years. About 1,900 members of the Unite union at the Port of Felixstowe in Suffolk are walking out for eight days in a dispute over pay.

The staff at Felixstowe, on the east coast of England, are embarking on the industrial action in a dispute over pay, becoming the latest workers to strike in Britain as unions demand higher wages for members facing a cost-of-living crisis.

“Strike action will cause huge disruption and will generate massive shockwaves throughout the UK’s supply chain, but this dispute is entirely of the company’s own making,” said Bobby Morton, the Unite union’s national officer for docks.

“It [the company] has had every opportunity make our members a fair offer but has chosen not to do so.”

Unite said members rejected a 7% pay offer from the Felixstowe Dock and Railway Company, which it said was below the rate of inflation.A port spokesman said the strike was “disappointing”.

A picket line formed early on Sunday as the strike began, and the union said it would be manned until 22:00 on each day of the walkout.

About 2,550 people work at the Port of Felixstowe – the country’s busiest port, handle about 48% of the UK’s container trade. Striking workers include crane drivers, machine operators and stevedores who load and unload ships.

Port spokesman Paul Davey said the average pay for workers at Felixstowe was £43,000, and employees had been offered a 7% rise plus a single payment of £500 – an offer rejected by the port unions.

He said the offer represented an increase of between 8.1% and 9.6%, depending upon the category of worker at the port, at a time when the average pay increase in the country was 5%.

“We’ve got a shrinking economy, we’re going into recession… I think that’s a very fair offer indeed,” he said.

Major shipping group Maersk warned that it expected the strike to cause serious disruption with some vessels significantly delayed.

Source: https://shipsandports.com.ng/port-of-felixstowe-dockworkers-on-strike-for-first-time-in-30-years/

July 2022 saw total container throughput (full and empty) up 3.7 per cent over July 2021 with a total of 285,561 TEU.

Year to date container volumes are up 3.7 per cent.

Total empty container movements were 16.2 per cent above July 2021.

Full overseas imports were up 3.9 per cent on July 2021 with strong trade flowing through post Shanghai lockdowns, whilst full container exports were down 5.7 per cent on July 2021, with miscellaneous manufactures, timber, barley, non-alcoholic beverages and fresh fruit below last year’s levels.

Full container transshipments came in at 11.1 per cent below July 2021.

Container trade for early August 2022 is tracking above the comparative month in 2021.

The news comes after container volumes at Australia’s largest container port have suffered since the beginning of this year.

In May 2022, the port saw total container throughput (full and empty) decline 6 per cent over the same period the previous year, with a total of 271,053 TEU.

Year-to-date container volumes were also down 1.9 per cent.

“The global supply chain continues to be challenged, and despite some evidence of consumer spending slowing due to inflationary pressures, there remains ongoing congestion at major hubs and inland networks,” the port wrote in its trade outlook.

Overflow of volume has been seen to neighbouring ports due to industrial action across parts of the US, UK and Germany, the port wrote, in addition to weather issues, ongoing issues related to the Ukraine conflict, and the fact that ports are continuing to work through large volumes of backlog cargo.

“Trade volumes to Australia remain strong however congestion continues to be seen in the Oceania region due to severe weather and vessel bunching. Locally the supply chain remains resilient and we continue to monitor the situation ahead of peak season.”

Source: Shanghai lockdown

The Port of Long Beach reported July throughput numbers on Tuesday, showing its most active July on record despite a “cooldown” in consumer spending.

Dockworkers and terminal operators at the port moved 785,843 TEU in July, a slim 0.13% increase from the previous record set in July 2021.

Total throughput was boosted by rising empty export containers, offsetting a year-over-year imports decline. Imports fell 1.8% to 376,175 TEUs, while empty containers moved through the port rose 2.8% to 300,257 TEUs. Exports were down 0.5% to 109,411 TEUs.

Looking by month, July’s numbers came in about 6% below June, which capped the port’s strongest quarter on record in Q2 2022, marking two consecutive quarters of record setting cargo volumes despite headwinds from inflation and fears of a looming recession.

“We are continuing to seek solutions to improve efficiency as a record-breaking number of containers move through the Port,” said Port of Long Beach Executive Director Mario Cordero. “We hope to relieve some of the stress points by continuing to support a transition of the entire supply chain to 24/7 operations and ensuring our industry partners can track containers with our new Supply Chain Information Highway data solution.”

With July’s final numbers in, the Port of Long Beach has now broken monthly records in six out of the last seven months. Year-to-date, cargo volumes are up 4.6% compared to the same period in 2021, when the Port of Long Beach handled record cargo volumes of more than 9.3 million TEU.

“Our waterfront workforce continues to ensure trade moves through the Port at a record-setting pace,” said Long Beach Harbor Commission President Sharon L. Weissman. “We continue to strengthen our partnerships with labor and industry to ensure our spot as a leader in trans-Pacific trade.”

The National Retail Federation said Monday it expects 2022 container imports into United States to surpass 2021 despite a “significant” slowdown over the remainder of the year.

Many retailers this year have brought in cargo early and shifted to East and Gulf Coast ports to avoid any potential disruptions related to ongoing contract negotiations between dockworkers and employers at West Coast ports. The NRF is predicting the slowdown to start in August and continue through the remainder of the year before deepening in 2023.

This West to East cargo shift has knocked the Port of Long Beach out of second place in the rankings of top U.S. container ports as Long Beach’s volumes now trail behind the Port of New York and New Jersey, which has not yet reported July numbers. The Port of Savannah has also been a benificiary of this shift, with the port reporting an 18% surge in cargo volumes in July compared to 2021.

Unfortunately, the shift has also contributed to growing backups on the East Coast, with most ships now arriving late. On the other hand, Port of Long Beach and Los Angeles backups have eased considerably from January’s peak, but with 25 ships still waiting in the queue as of Monday, they aren’t out of the woods yet.

Source: https://gcaptain.com/empties-lift-port-of-long-beach-to-new-july-record-as-imports-fall/

Critics of China’s Belt and Road program have long warned of the potential military uses of the Chinese-operated port at Hambantota, Sri Lanka, and successive Sri Lankan governments have denied that the port would benefit China’s PLA Navy. This past weekend, a Chinese missile tracking ship tried to call at the port, setting off a minor diplomatic scuffle with India and providing new evidence for the critique.

In 2016, a Chinese state-owned enterprise took over the port of Hambantota, Sri Lanka, on exceptionally favorable terms. The Sri Lankan government was heavily in debt to China, and to raise funds, it granted a 99-year lease on the underutilized port complex to China Merchants Port Holdings (CM Port) in exchange for $1.1 billion. For critics of China’s Belt and Road development program, Hambantota immediately became the go-to example of Beijing’s “debt diplomacy”: saddling a developing nation with debt to build unneeded infrastructure, then taking control of the distressed assets.

As a deepwater port, Hambantota also has dual-use application as a potential naval resupply point, which China’s critics in New Delhi and Washington, D.C. were quick to point out. Sri Lanka’s government has pushed back on this suggestion over the years. “There are no foreign naval bases in Sri Lanka,” Ranil Wikremesinghe, then prime minister of Sri Lanka, said in 2018. “The Hambantota Port is a commercial joint venture between our ports authority and China Merchants.”

These suspicions were put to the test this month with the planned arrival of the spy ship Yuan Wang 5, a ballistic missile and satellite tracking ship in China’s research vessel fleet. She was due to transit to Hambantota, arriving August 11 and departing August 17 after conducting replenishment. Her mission in the Indian Ocean, according to the China-oriented consultancy Belt and Road Initiative Sri Lanka (BRISL), is to “conduct space tracking, satellite control and research tracking in the northwestern part of the Indian Ocean region through August and September.”

However, India protested the plans for the ship’s arrival. India and Sri Lanka share a defense treaty that prohibits Colombo from allowing a foreign military (like China’s PLA Navy) to use Sri Lankan ports if the use damages India’s interests. The timing was particularly sensitive because India had just provided Sri Lanka with $4.5 billion in aid to bail out its collapsing economy.

After New Delhi’s objections, the (newly-formed) Sri Lankan administration of President Ranil Wickremesinghe asked the Chinese embassy to postpone the Yuan Wang 5’s port call “until further consultations.”

“Letting the Chinese military vessel dock at Hambantota would have compounded Sri Lanka’s other India-unfriendly actions since 2014, when two Chinese submarines separately docked at a new, Chinese-built container terminal in Colombo Port,” said Indian defense strategist Prof. Brahma Chellaney, speaking to the Times of India.

Source: https://maritime-executive.com/article/sri-lanka-turns-chinese-naval-vessel-away-from-port-of-hambantota