WASHINGTON: The volume of cargo passing through the country’s ports rose 9% in the first nine months of the year, the Philippine Ports Authority (PPA) reported, attributing the rise to the growing economy and the rush to have goods in stores by Christmas. Throughput hit 183.73 million metric tons (MMT) in the January to September period compared with the 168.074 MMT logged a year earlier. Foreign volumes rose by 12.72%, boosted by a 15% increase in exports to 55.134 MMT for the period in review. Domestic volume, meanwhile, grew modestly by 3.87% to 67.139 MMT.
Import volume posted a double-digit growth of 10.75% to 61.459 MMT from 55.490 MMT seen in the first nine months last year. “This is a great indication that Philippine exporters are gearing up to compete in the international market and will not be left out in the run-up to Christmas,” PPA General Manager Jay Daniel R. Santiago was quoted as saying in a statement on Wednesday.
“The double-digit growth in the import volume suggests that imported Christmas cargoes have also started to come in. However, even with the strong performance of both sectors, our ports continue to operate under optimum conditions and we do not expect any slowdown in the movement at any given time,” he added.
In particular, PPA said the increases in cargo volume were observed at ports in Agusan, Mindoro, Bicol, Western Leyte/Biliran and Negros Oriental/Siquijor and the North Port remains the top performer in terms of domestic cargo volume, accounting for 17.87 MMT or 24.8% of total domestic volume and 9.73% of the total cargo throughput nationwide, followed by Cagayan de Oro, Davao and Zamboanga. Container traffic, on the other hand, registered a 9.36% increase in volume for the nine months with 4.684 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) compared to the 4.283 million TEUs processed in the same period last year.
“Foreign boxes dominated the containerized traffic after posting an 11.51% hike with volume reaching 2.869 million TEUs as compared to the 2.573 million TEUs handled in 2015 while domestic cargoes reached 1.814 million TEUs or 6.12% higher than the 4.283 million TEUs posted last year,” PPA said in its statement, noting that of the total foreign containers, import boxes totaled 1.450 million TEUs while export boxes hit 1.419 million TEUs, increasing 13.97% and 9.11%, respectively. The North Port ranked first in terms of volume of domestic boxes handled during the period with 906,519 TEUs while the Manila International Container Terminal handled the bulk of the foreign containerized cargoes with 1.602 million TEUs followed by the Manila South Harbor with 774,692 TEUs and Davao at 306,203 TEUs.
