Public-private partnerships and their role in enhancing the cargo handling efficiency of container lines in the Black sea

Abstract

The article discusses the current situation in the container shipping market and the terminal infrastructure in the Black Sea region. The analysis is based on the container fleet database accumulated by the author. These data are used for making observations and predictions and drawing conclusions about the dynamics of the marine transportation market. The methodological framework comprises theoretical, empirical and mathematical methods. The comparative analysis of container services of different Russian terminals and ports has shown that the market is now undergoing major transformations and suffers from a considerable imbalance due to the rapid growth in deadweight tonnage and the insufficient capacity of the infrastructure, which means that it is unable to keep up with the rising demand.  The excess of deadweight tonnage and the shortage of the necessary equipment leads to chronic bottlenecks in cargo handling, cargo clearance and so on.  To address these problems, it is proposed to explore the opportunities provided by the integration of public-private partnerships into the service structure of maritime transport. By focusing on the case of the Russian port of Novorossyisk, the article demonstrates that public-private partnerships are able to enhance the efficiency of cargo-handling operations of container lines in the Black Sea region.