Colombo, Nov 2 – Sri Lanka’s Colombo Port has moved up two places to become the 25th busiest container port, next to Vietnam’s Ho Chi Minh City, helped by a Chinese run terminal, a global ranking has shown.
In 2016 Colombo’s volumes grew 10.6 percent to 5.734 million twenty foot equivalent units (TEUs) helping it overtake Bremen/Bremerhaven (5.535 mn) in Germany and Tanjung Prion (5.515mn) in Indonesia, in a ranking of top 100 container ports by Lloyd’s List.
“The significant rise in volumes came as a result of an influx of ultra large containerships calling the Colombo International Container Terminal, situated in the port’s new south harbour development, capable of handling three ULCs simultaneously,” the publication said.
CICT is operated by China Merchant Holdings group.
Ho Chi Minh City retained its position as the 24th busiest port with volumes growing 3.4 percent to 5.98 million units in 2016.
Chinese ports dominates the list with Shanghai in top spot 37.13 million TEUs, Shenzen in third with 23.97 million units, Ningbo-Zhoustan (4th place) with 21.56 million units, Hong Kong (6th) with 19.81 million, Guangzhou (7th) 18.8 million and Qindao (8th place) with 18.0 million units.
Outside of China only Singapore (2nd place) with 30.9 million units, South Korea’s Busan (5th place) 19.85 million and Dubai (9th place) with 14.77 million were outside China. (EconomyNext)