Eurostat: Maritime transport statistics – short sea shipping of goods at port level – 2022

Brussels, Belgium (Ports Europe) October 21, 2024 - Eurostat has published statistics for short sea shipping (SSS) statistics in the European Union (EU) ports in 2022, covering the transport of goods between main ports in the EU Member States and ports situated in geographical Europe or in non-European countries on the Mediterranean Sea and the Black Sea. The top 20 EU ports accounted for 42 % of EU short-sea shipping The top 20 ports accounted for 42% of the total short-sea shipped goods handled in the main EU ports in 2022. Rotterdam remained the largest EU port for short-sea shipping, handling a total of 194 million tonnes of short-sea shipped goods in 2022. Among the other top three ports, Antwerp-Bruges handled 127 million tonnes of short-shipped goods in 2022, and Trieste handled 50 million tonnes. Half of the top 20 EU ports registered a growth in 2022 compared with 2021. Among them, Gdansk reported the highest increase, with +28.9 %, followed by Constanta (+18.6 %), Barcelona (+13.9 %), Zeeland Seaports (+10.8 %) and Ravenna (+10.1 %). By contrast, Livorno, Hamburg and Rotterdam reported the highest drops, with -21.5 %, -13.9 % and -12.4 %, respectively, over the same period. Seven of the main deep-sea hub ports, Rotterdam, Antwerp-Bruges, Amsterdam, Hamburg, HAROPA, Valencia, and Barcelona, handled more deep-sea shipping than short-sea shipping of goods. By contrast, all the other top 20 ports for short-sea shipping handled more short-sea than deep-sea shipped goods. In particular, 98 % of the goods handled in the port of Dublin were short-sea shipped. Rotterdam handled 13 % of the total short-sea shipped liquid bulk goods reported by the main EU ports in 2022 At 108 million tonnes, Rotterdam handled 13 % of the total short-sea shipped liquid bulk goods reported by the main EU ports in 2022, by far the largest volume of short-sea shipped liquid bulk for any EU port. With 22 million tonnes, Amsterdam recorded a substantial increase (+16.9 %) in 2022, compared with 2021. In 2022, the share of short sea shipped liquid bulk on the total sea transport of liquid bulk was particularly pronounced in the port of Trieste, with 78%. Rotterdam was the EU's largest port for short sea shipping of dry bulk goods At 21 million tonnes in 2022, Rotterdam was also the EU's largest port for short-sea shipping of dry bulk goods, despite a large fall of 25.5% compared with the previous year. Amsterdam also reported a substantial fall by 12.8% over the same period. By contrast the three other ports of the top 5 recorded substantial increases: Ravenna (+18.3%), Zeeland Seaports (+17.7%) and Constanta (+17.%). In 2022, the share of short sea shipped dry bulk on the total sea transport of dry bulk was higher than 50% in Ravenna (71%), Constanta (64%) and Zeeland Seaports (54%). In Rotterdam, the share was 27% while in Amsterdam it was 43%. The top 5 ports for containers handled 38 % of the total short sea shipped container goods in main EU ports, in terms of gross weight of goods Antwerp-Bruges and Rotterdam were the EU's two largest ports for short sea goods shipped in containers, each with 40 million tonnes in 2022. Altogether, the two ports represented 21 % of total short-sea shipped goods in containers reported by the main EU ports in 2022. These two ports recorded substantial decreases in 2022 compared with 2021: Rotterdam by 17.3% and Antwerp-Bruges by 10.6%). Gioia Tauro was the only port in the top 5 to increase over the same period (+1.7%). Unlike dry bulk segment, for instance, short sea shipping of goods in containers is concentrated around a limited number of main hub ports. In 2022, the top 5 ports for containers handled 38 % of the total short sea shipped container goods in main EU ports, in terms of gross weight of goods. In 2022, the share of short sea shipped goods in containers on the total sea transport of goods in containers was below 50 % for Antwerp-Bruges, Rotterdam and Hamburg, while Gioia Tauro and Piraeus had shares of 88 % and 60 %, respectively. Antwerp-Bruges was the largest port for short-sea shipped goods on roll-on and roll-off units Antwerp-Bruges was the largest port for short-sea shipped goods on roll-on and roll-off (Ro-Ro) units, with 21 million tonnes in 2022. Compared with 2021, all top 5 ports recorded decreases, except for Antwerp-Bruges, where the increase was +2%. Calais recorded the highest fall, with -27.6%, followed by Lubeck (-8%). In 2022, the goods on Ro-Ro units were exclusively short sea shipped in Calais, Trelleborg and Lubeck, while in Antwerp-Bruges and Rotterdam, short sea shipping of goods on Ro-Ro units represented 89.1% and 99.8% of the total sea transport of goods on Ro-Ro units. The original Eurostat article contains complementary graphs. © European Union, 1995-2024

Eurostat: Maritime transport statistics – short sea shipping of goods at port level – 2022

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Eurostat: Maritime transport statistics – short sea shipping of goods at port level – 2022

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All news

Cocaine seized in Port of Vigo, Galicia

Port of Algeciras cargo stays constant in Jan-Oct 2024

Fedespedi releases 8th edition of its economic and financial analysis on container terminals

Update: Chinese ship investigated for severed Baltic’s undersea cables

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Our Expert Analysis

Latest Free Reads

Top Ports