Hamburg: export growth – import downturn

The positive result on general cargo was mainly by growth in the handling loaded containers; the total of 5.8m teu represents an increase of 1.8%, mainly for export, which, at around 2.9m teu were 6.9% higher than the corresponding period in 2011. This positive trend offset the 2.6% downturn in imports of loaded containers, where volume reached 2.9m teu.

At 1.6m tonnes, total volume of non-containerised general cargo was 15.4% down on the comparable period 2011, while the trend for exports, including one million tonnes of conventional cargo, was positive (up 2.6%), primarily attributable to exports of vehicles, heavy cargoes and project cargo. Throughput of imports at 545,000 tonnes was weaker (down 36.2%).

Although the port booked an 8.3% reverse in throughput in the Asian container trade at 3.6m teu, container throughput in all other trades proved to be on a growth path. The downturn in the Asian trade was primarily caused by a problematical economic environment in Europe and the cooling-off in China’s foreign trade; this weakened container throughput with China (including Hong Kong) at 2m teu (down 11.6%).