The balance of 760,000 TEU was handled by smaller terminals including Jurong Port, which handled the lion share (724,000 TEU). “2009 was a year of unprecedented hardship and challenges for the port and shipping industries. The global economic downturn and massive slump in global trade caused a drastic drop in demand for container shipping,” said Eddie Teh, Group CEO, PSA International. Despite the slowdown in container throughput investments in expanding terminals to create additional container capacity continue. According to a PSA Corporate spokesman, a total of 20 container berths at Phases 1 and 2 of Pasir Panjang Terminal (PPT) are currently in operation, with another three berths coming on stream progressively. When the Pasir Panjang Terminal Phase 2 is fully completed, PSA will have a total of 54 container berths at its four container terminals in Singapore – Pasir Panjang Terminal, Tanjong Pagar Terminal, Keppel Terminal and Brani Terminal. The 54 container berths will have a total capacity of 35 million TEU. As part of long-term planning, the Ministry of Transport and the Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore (MPA) are also proceeding with the development of Phases 3 and 4 at Pasir Panjang Terminal. This will add another 16 new berths with additional handling capacity of 14 million TEU to the Pasir Panjang Terminal.
For 2010, expectations are that these figures improve as many economies are getting ‘back on their feet’. Although nobody at Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore’s (MPA) would like to make an estimate for 2010, PSA Singapore Terminals handled 11.3 million TEUs from January to May 2010, up 13.7% from the same period in 2009. It this growth would continue PSA would be able to handle a total of 27.12 million TEU and smaller terminals will contribute around 864,120 TEU giving Singapore a total of almost 28 million TEU. But according to Teh, although the last two months of 2009 and the first two months of 2010 showed tentative signs of recovery the road ahead will be bumpy and uncertain, and all indications point towards a slow and drawn out recovery with different regions rebounding at different rates.
Good news – bad news
Between January and October of this year, Singapore terminals handled 23.6 million TEU, up 11% compared with 21.3 million TEU in the same period last year. In October alone, they posted an increase of 4.7% year-on-year in container throughput to 2.4 million TEU from 2.3 million TEU in October 2009, according to Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore. Total cargo volumes handled by Singapore’s terminals were up 7% in the first 10 months to 417 million tonnes from 390 million tonnes in the corresponding period of 2009, the authority said. Among the terminals, PSA International, Singapore’s largest container port, handled 2.3 million TEU in October, up about 4.5% from 2.2 million TEU in October 2009. But in November, Shanghai Port, Singapore’s major contestant for its Top 100 Container Port ranking saw container throughput rise by 19.5% year-on-year to 2.6 million TEU from 2.2 million TEU, while its total cargo throughput increased 33% to 40.7 million tonnes from 30.7 million tonnes the year before. Shanghai International Port Group (SIPG) reported to have witnessed an increase of 20% in total cargo throughput for the first 11 months to 391 million tonnes. Total container throughput handled by the Chinese largest port operator grew by 18% to 26.6 million TEU between January and November of this year, compared with 22.6 million TEU in the previous year. This would be disappointing news for Singapore as SIPG outperformed its regional rival in the first 10 months. Over this period SIPG recorded container throughput of 23.9 million TEU compared with 23.6 million TEU for Singapore.