In the seven months of 2019, the sea ports of Ukraine handled 85.5 million tons of cargo, up 16% on the same period last year.
Transshipment was 700,000 tons, up on 2018. “The increase in transshipment volumes in Ukrainian seaports occurred throughout all seven months from the beginning of 2019. The basis of this growth is grain cargo and ore, which together provide more than 55% of the total transshipment and more than 60% of exports through the ports”, said Ukrainian Sea Ports Authority (USPA) head Raivis Veckagans.
He added that another important trend was the double-digit increase in container handling, for the second year in a row. According to USPA, the handling of containerized cargo in ports has already increased by 20%.
According to the results of seven months of 2019, the leaders in terms of growth in transshipment volumes were grain cargo and ore. Cereals made up one third of the total cargo in ports, 28.3 million tons, with a transshipment increase of almost 35% (by 7.3 million tons). It should be noted a significant increase in grain transit in the first seven months of the year – more than 53%, due to the transshipment of such goods from Moldova through the port of Reni, which provided more than 90% of grain transit. The increase in ore transshipment also almost reached 30%, about 20.2 million tons.
Significant, almost 430,000 tons, turned out to be an increase in the processing of chemical and mineral fertilizers (bulk – by 14.5%, packaged – more than five times). Container handling growth trend continues: + 91,000 TEU (+ 20%) for the first seven months of 2019.
As before, the export of products of Ukrainian enterprises abroad remains the basis for the positive dynamics of an increase in cargo transshipment in Ukrainian seaports. Over the reporting period, it grew by more than 22% compared to the same period last year. Whereas imports yielded an increase of 4.4%, and transit decreased by 11.2%.
Among Ukrainian seaports, the leaders in transshipment are four ports, which provided the handling of more than 87% of the total cargo volume over the past seven months. Yuzhny has exceeded 28.1 million tons (+24.3% compared with the first seven months of last year). Nikolaev, almost 18.2 million tons (+23.3%), Chernomorsk, almost 14.2 million tons (+18.8%) and Odessa, almost 14 million tons (+14.1%).
In the first seven months of the year, 6,709 vessels visited sea ports of Ukraine, which is 0.9% or 62 units less than in the same period last year. Most of the vessels were handled in the Izmail seaport (2,144), Nikolaev (1,011) and in the port of Chernomorsk (943).
Since the beginning of the year, more than 322,000 people have used water transport services in the seaports of Ukraine , which is 82% more than in the same period last year. Of these, nearly 317,500 took advantage of domestic transport – mainly cruise and pleasure routes – in the ports of Odessa and Ust-Dunaysk. Foreign traffic amounted to more than 4,680 people in the ports of Ust-Dunaysk (cruise river liners) and Odessa.
In the first seven months of 2019, 5,775 vessels (voyages) passed the Dnieper, which is 31% less than in the same period last year. The total volume of cargo transportation amounted to almost 5.5 million tons, which is 1.3 million tons more than in the first half of 2018. Basically it – cereals (amounts are increased in 2,3 times and reached 2.2 million tons) and construction loads (-5.7%, volume nearly 2.4 million tons), and also metal products (34%, 835 thousand tons).
Source: USPA
https://www.portseurope.com/ukraine-sea-ports-see-increased-traffic-in-first-seven-months-of-2019/