Throughput at Italian container ports in 2003 grew by 8.5% to reach almost 9 million teu. The variation is consistent with the general rising trend of the past four years, increasing from 7,106,000 teu in 1999 to 8,903,000 in 2003 (+8.5% p.a. on average). The largest contribution came from the three transhipment hubs at Cagliari (+ 270,000 teu), Taranto (+ 187,000 teu) and Gioia Tauro (+ 127,000 teu), which together accounted for 82% of the difference between 2002 and 2003. The three ports account for 45% of Italy's total liftings. Among gateways ports, good performance have been reported by the main ones: + 75,000 teu in Genoa (+ 4.9%), + 46,000 teu in Livorno (+ 8.4%), + 42,000 in Salerno (+ 11.2%) and + 31,000 teu in La Spezia (+ 3.2%). It was a positive year also for Venice (+ 22,000 teu, + 8.4%) and Bari (+ 12,000 teu, +100%) while 2003 was rather modest for Rome's port, Civitavecchia (- 7,000 teu, - 20%), Ancona (+ 18,000 teu, -19%), Naples (-16,000 teu, -3%) and especially Trieste (- 68,000 teu), -37%), which suffered the heaviest loss. Steady traffic was reported in Palermo (+ 4,000 teu, +36,4%), Ravenna (- 1,000 teu, -0.1%), Savona (- 2,000 teu, -3.5% and the remaining secondary ports (- 4,000 teu, -9.5%).
ITJ