The port of Valencia loses 220,000 transit containers and its traffic falls by 6.3% this year

The first Spanish port for container traffic, Valencia, is suffering. According to the Port Authority of Valencia, so far this year this traffic has been reduced by 220,000 TEUs (the standard twenty-foot container), which has meant a drop of 6.23% in total container traffic in what it’s year

Despite the fact that the Port Authority highlights the recovery of import traffic, the truth is that the drop in containers that make a stopover in Valencia is already making a dent in total traffic. Thus, the fall between January and August of containers in transit exceeds 13% and in general merchandise the fall is 2.74%. And this despite the growth in other cargoes such as liquid bulk, mainly due to the greater volume of liquefied natural gas.

“This decrease in transshipment confirms that the port of Valencia is at more than 80% of its occupation and on some days of maximum activity diseconomies of scale are recorded that encourage shipping companies to look for other ports in the western Mediterranean for these containers,” says the Port Authority that even uses the word “leakage” of containers. In addition, he considers that this situation is .

Recovery of the cruise sector

The PAV data also shows the recovery of passenger transport after some difficult years marked by the COVID-19 pandemic. The Valenciaport docks have received 899,870 passengers in January and August this year, an increase of 143%. Of these, more than a third of the total, 352,646 are cruise passengers, a figure that borders on pre-pandemic data, and the rest, 547,224 are passengers going to or coming from or to the Balearic Islands.

In this month of August, a total of 103,385 passengers have docked, marking the record of tourists who have arrived in the city in a month.

By country, by total merchandise traffic, the United States continues to lead commercial relations with Valenciaport with a total of 6,226,143 tons mobilized, which represents 21.81% more compared to January-August 2021. The increase must be highlighted of imports that have multiplied by two due to the growth of natural gas that arrives from the North American country. Next comes Italy with 5,166,903 tons, a figure similar to the previous year. The transalpine country continues ahead of China since with the Asian giant 4,334,492 tons were mobilized with a decrease of 6.33%. The greatest growth is in the United Kingdom with a rise of 64.22%, the Netherlands (+35.05%), Romania (+22.12%) or Nigeria (+20.66%)