Nationwide, the Corps received $1.72 billion from the Disaster Relief Appropriations Act of 2012, which was signed by President Obama Dec. 23. Of that, $55 million of an overall $534 million dedication for operation and maintenance of inland waterway systems nationwide was directed to the Lower Mississippi River to restore the channel from Baton Rouge to the Head of Passes at the mouth of the River.

“This is tremendous news not only for the Port of New Orleans and the local maritime community, but for the growers, producers and manufacturers in the 32 states that depend on the Lower Mississippi River to get their goods to global markets,” said Gary LaGrange, the Port’s President and CEO.

The Louisiana delegation in both the House and Senate worked tirelessly in a bi-partisan fashion to secure the additional funds, which brings the Corps’ budget for operation and maintenance on the Lower Mississippi River to more than $126 million this year, including the Corps’ original $72.6 million budget for the waterway. Over the last decade, the average cost to maintain the Lower Mississippi River is about $104 million.

“The entire Louisiana delegation is to be commended for their efforts to secure the money necessary to fully restore the Lower Mississippi River’s channel to its full dimensions,” LaGrange said. “The River serves more than two-thirds of the nation’s consumers and moves about 450 million tons of international cargo worth about $114 billion annually.”

That cargo consists of two-thirds of the U.S. grain exports and is vital to other commodities, such as export coal, petroleum products, and U.S. refining capacity – along with cargo activity at the Port of New Orleans.

U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu and U.S. Rep. Rodney Alexander – both members of their respective chambers’ Appropriations Committee, were instrumental in securing the additional funding. However, all members of the delegation, including: Sen. David Vitter, Rep. Cedric Richmond, Rep. Steve Scalise, Rep. Charles Boustany, Rep. Bill Cassidy, Rep. John Flemming and Rep. Jeff Landry were supportive of the efforts.

Central and Eastern Europe – most notably Poland and Russia – have been eyed by ports in the North Range as key growth markets in the recent past. Container traffic in these regions has been growing quickly during the past two decades and their share in the major North Range ports’ container traffic reached 10% in 2010.1 The share of feeder traffic as opposed to hinterland traffic is particularly high for these regions, which means that containers have to be moved twice between ship and shore. Accordingly, Central and Eastern Europe was slightly more important for total quayside handling (14%). These shares would have been higher, hadn’t it been for Maersk’s rearranged AE10 Far East service, which is now also call-ing in Gdansk and hence reducing the volume of boxes transhipped in the North Range ports.

During the past years, there was harsh competition for transhipment between the North Range ports and the Baltic Sea and Northern Europe. After a noticeable market share shift from German ports to Dutch and Belgian ports in 2009 and 2010, transhipment volumes started to move back to Germany in 2011. In 2010, Bremen/Bremerhaven was the most im-portant feeder port for the Baltic Sea. Hamburg – which was by far the largest feeder port in Northern Europe before the crisis – followed closely.

Next to feeder traffic, intra-European shortsea trade via North Range ports is also increasing. In this segment, traffic between the continent and the British Isles is dominant, but shortsea trade between Western Europe and Russia is increasing strongly.

Despite the particular dynamics in Central and Eastern Europe, Germany is by far the most important country for the North Range ports with 9.2 million TEU of hinterland traffic in 2010 – more than one in three containers moved between the North Range ports and their hinterland by barge, rail or truck. Currently, the six major continental North Range ports handle more than 95% of Germany’s containerised trade. Mediterranean ports like Genoa or Koper are still of negligible importance, while smaller ports in the North Range mostly focus on niche trades.

The total container traffic of the major North Range ports has reached 37.3 million TEU in 2010, still about two million TEU short of the 2008 results. According to latest data from the Global Port Tracker – North Europe Edition, the volume increased to around 40 million TEU in 2011 – a new all-time high. Hinterland traffic probably reached more than 25 million TEU for the first time, most notably thanks to the solid performance of the German economy throughout the year.

Kevin Hobbs will take on responsibility for all operations at Pembroke Port and Milford Docks, including ferry and stevedoring, operation of the marina and Milford Haven Ship Repairers, as well as the Estates department.

Mr Hobbs will bring to the various MHPA trading operations based at those facilities, strong commercial leadership and a wealth of operational management experience at a time when the Port is evolving. He’ll be taking forward plans to attract marine renewables investment to the Port, as well as putting together plans for new development in both Milford Docks and Pembroke Port.

Having begun his career with Ready Mixed Concrete Group with particular responsibility for sea dredged aggregates in South Wales, Kevin moved into ferry operations in 1991 when he joined Merchant Ferries.  He went on to progress through various roles, culminating in becoming CEO and Managing Director of Seatruck Ferries from 2000 through to 2008, during which time he took the business from start-up through to becoming a profitable ferry business operating five ferries across the Irish Sea.

Commenting on his appointment, Mr Hobbs said, “This is a very exciting time to be joining the team at Milford Haven Port. Our Deep Sea Operations are very well established of course and we are associated strongly with that business. However, in the Short Sea operations, there are some exciting plans emerging to make the most of the outstanding facilities we have at both Pembroke Port and Milford Docks. Our tenants include some world-class companies with exciting plans of their own too. And there is the huge opportunity presented by marine renewable energy. Those are the kind of challenges I am really looking forward to”.

CEO of MHPA, Alec Don, said, “We are delighted to welcome Kevin aboard.  Milford Docks and Pembroke Port are our principal port assets offering 80m alongside the various quays and berths.  They fundamentally serve different markets to the Deep Sea part of MHPA’s business, and need a dedicated management focus in order to fulfil the plans we have been developing for these important facilities.  This appointment is very much about the future, and I and all of our colleagues at MHPA look forward to working with Kevin in the months and years to come.”

Over the past three years Kevin Hobbs has provided consultancy and interim management services to clients such as Dublin Port Company, Peel Ports, Stena, Poole Harbour Commissioners, and Milford Haven Port Authority.

The supply of these cranes to Termont Montreal brings the total number of Liebherr RTG’s operating at the facility to eleven. Liebherr have also previously supplied Termont with two ship to shore cranes. Speaking after handover, Gerry Bunyan, sales and marketing manager at Liebherr Container Cranes explained that this level of repeat business from a client is nothing new.  “Since Liebherr started making container cranes in 1967, we have always had a large amount of repeat business. This has become particularly noticeable in recent years, with many of our clients continuing their long partnership with Liebherr, and newer clients placing repeat orders.” He continues “When it comes to choosing port equipment, our clients have made a distinct move to evaluating the cost of a crane over its entire life time. They already have firsthand experience with the low running and maintenance cost of a Liebherr crane and have witnessed the levels of productivity and efficiencies that Liebherr Cranes bring to a port. The ports are then in a position to service their clients quicker, and more cost effectively which is what we are all aiming for.”