Transhipment drives growth of Malaysian ports    

NST Logistics 08 January 2007

Driven by a strong increase in the volume of transshipment containers handled, the total container trade at Malaysian ports last year posted an impressive 12 per cent increase over the volume the ports handled the previous year.
 
Total volume of containers handled by local ports increased to 13.6 million TEUs, up from 12.0 million TEUs handled in 2005 with a third of the volume accounted for by volumes at the Port of Tanjung Pelepas that is the largest container port in the country.
 
With more than half the total volume of containers handled by ports in the country now composed of transshipment traffic, the trend towards transshipment driving the growth of major ports is expected to further intensify and, indeed it seems, inevitable.
 
This trend is especially expected to accentuate in view of the lower prospects for growth of national trade that as reflected in the container volumes generated on account of the national trade handled by major ports.
 
Thus, while PTP and Westport recorded surging growth on account of the strong growth in transshipment traffic, national gateway ports like Northport, Penang and Johor have to contend with single-digit growths.
 
In fact the growth in transshipment at Westport, at Port Klang was somewhat unprecedented – in excess of 30 per cent – it what appears to be against the trend that prevailed at Northport, the other port terminal at Port Klang that counts its strength on handling national trade.
 
The surge in transshipment at Westport – that includes the handing of re-stow, re-positioning and empty containers – has steeply increased the port’s dependence on transshipment for its survival, making up 70 per cent of the total volume of containers handled by the port.
 
Westport, which handled 2.9 million TEUs in 2005, of which 1.9 million TEUs made the transshipment volume, last year recorded a total volume of 3.7 million TEUs, with 2.3 million TEUs making up the transshipment volume.
 
Unlike Westport, Northport, which is the largest national gateway port, retained its strong cargo base from volumes generated by national trade, while also making inroads into transshipment.
 
Total volume of containers handled by Northport rose marginally less than 1 per cent to 2.7 million TEUs.
 
Despite the higher volume of containers handled by Westport, it received fewer ship calls that did Northport consistent with the characteristics of a transshipment port that generally does more “ship exchange” of containers (that includes re-stowing and re-positioning of empty containers by ships calling at the port).
 
The average number of containers per ship at Westport was thus about 640 TEUs compared with 436 recorded by Northport, based on ship calls totaling 5,600 ship calls and 5,900 ships calls by Northport and Westport, respectively.
 
As an international hub port, the dependence on transshipment by PTP, which handled a hefty total 4.7 million TEUs last year, is even higher at more than 95 per cent but overall growth has slowed down.
 
With the maturing of the cargo base at PTP, growth has somewhat lowered than the levels achieved in its early years as it raced to establish itself among the top 18 container ports in the world in a record time of less than 4 years since its commenced operations.
 
Growths at Penang and Johor, which handle largely national trade, remained satisfactory with container volumes totaling 843,000 TEUs and 873,000 TEUs respectively last year.
 
Outside the port system in Peninsular Malaysia, Bintulu Port in Sarawak made a impressive comeback with a commendable growth of 27 per cent handling a total of 188, 395 TEUs.
 
The coming on stream of resource-based projects at its immediate hinterland helped to push the container volumes at the leading port in East Malaysia that suffered reverses the previous year on account of competition from neighbouring ports.

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