• Home
  • About
    • Members
    • Associate Members
    • Former members
  • Thematic Areas
    • Containers
    • Cruise
    • European Port Policy
    • Ports & COVID-19
  • PortStudies
  • Presentations
  • Noticeboard
  • Viewpoints
  • PortLibrary
  • PortReport
PortEconomics
  • October 3rd, 2025
PortEconomics
  • Home
  • About
    • Members
    • Associate Members
    • Former members
  • Thematic Areas
    • Containers
    • Cruise
    • European Port Policy
    • Ports & COVID-19
  • PortStudies
    Investments and financing challenges of the EU’s port managing bodies; findings from a comprehensive survey

    Investments and financing challenges of the EU’s port managing bodies; findings from a comprehensive survey

    Evaluating customer satisfaction with clearing and forwarding agents:  Kuwait Shuwaikh Port

    Evaluating customer satisfaction with clearing and forwarding agents: Kuwait Shuwaikh Port

    Digital technologies for efficient and resilient sea-land logistics

    Digital technologies for efficient and resilient sea-land logistics

    Stakeholders’ attitudes toward container terminal automation

    Stakeholders’ attitudes toward container terminal automation

    Toward green container liner shipping: joint optimization of heterogeneous fleet deployment, speed optimization, and fuel bunkering

    Toward green container liner shipping: joint optimization of heterogeneous fleet deployment, speed optimization, and fuel bunkering

  • Presentations
    Port reform: World Bank publishes the third edition of its port reform toolkit

    Port reform: World Bank publishes the third edition of its port reform toolkit

    When will we admit that maritime transport will not be decarbonised by 2050?

    When will we admit that maritime transport will not be decarbonised by 2050?

    Digital technologies for efficient and resilient sea-land logistics

    Digital technologies for efficient and resilient sea-land logistics

    The World Ports Tracker in TOC Europe

    The World Ports Tracker in TOC Europe

    Newly-upgraded IAPH World Ports Tracker identifies major sustainability and market trends

    Newly-upgraded IAPH World Ports Tracker identifies major sustainability and market trends

  • Noticeboard
    Portgraphic: Top-15 EU container ports in H1 2025

    Portgraphic: Top-15 EU container ports in H1 2025

    PhD posts in the area of ports and energy transition

    PhD posts in the area of ports and energy transition

    PortEconomics members among best-performing scholars globally

    PortEconomics members among best-performing scholars globally

    Accessibility or connectivity: why is it correct to say that in the Caribbean the main logistics problem is connectivity?

    Accessibility or connectivity: why is it correct to say that in the Caribbean the main logistics problem is connectivity?

    Cruise Port-City Compass

    Cruise Port-City Compass

  • Viewpoints
    Portgraphic: Top-15 EU container ports in H1 2025

    Portgraphic: Top-15 EU container ports in H1 2025

    Portgraphic: fleet capacity (owned/chartered) of container shipping lines

    Portgraphic: fleet capacity (owned/chartered) of container shipping lines

    In a tight spot: American ports in global supply chains

    In a tight spot: American ports in global supply chains

    Cruise industry in 2025 at a glance

    Cruise industry in 2025 at a glance

    The box that makes the world go around: container terminals and global trade

    The box that makes the world go around: container terminals and global trade

  • PortLibrary
  • PortReport

Theo Notteboom

Dr. Theo Notteboom is co-founder and co-director of PortEconomics. He is a professor in port and maritime economics and management with about 25 years of experience in this area. His work is widely cited. He is a regular speaker at international conferences and a rapporteur/expert to leading organizations in the field. He is Chair Professor at Ghent University in Belgium. He is a visiting Research Professor at China Institute of FTZ Supply Chain of Shanghai Maritime University. He also is part-time Professor at University of Antwerp and the Antwerp Maritime Academy in Belgium. He previously held a full-time position as High-end Foreign Expert / Professor at Dalian Maritime University in China (2014-2016) and an MPA visiting professorship in port management at Nanyang Technological University (NTU) in Singapore. He is immediate past President (2010-2014) and Council Member of International Association of Maritime Economists (IAME). Between October 2006 and October 2014 he was President of ITMMA of the University of Antwerp. Between 2009 and 2014 he was Chairman of the Board of Directors of Belgian Institute of Transport Organizers (BITO), an institute of the Belgian Federal Government.

Author's Posts

The competitive position of the upgraded Panama canal

The competitive position of the upgraded Panama canal

Containers
How significant is the slowdown in chinese container ports? Containers

How significant is the slowdown in chinese container ports?

By Theo Notteboom Chinese container ports are feeling the full impact of the Chinese economic slowdown and the weak global economic situation. Over the years, we have become used to seeing high growth rates in Chinese ports, so the sudden change might come as a bit of surprise to many. How significant is the slowdown in container...
Port development in Sub-Saharan Africa: competitive forces, port reform & investment challenges Featured

Port development in Sub-Saharan Africa: competitive forces, port reform & investment challenges

The funding options available to South African container ports given their respective institutional position and port capacity needs are at the centre of the port study developed by PortEconomics co-director Τheo Notteboom and PortEconomics associate member Darren Fraser latest port study. The study under the title: The port...
Scenarios on alliance formation in container shipping Containers

Scenarios on alliance formation in container shipping

By Theo Notteboom Having demostrated (see inforgraphic below) how strategic alliances among container shipping companies have changed in the past 20 years, PortEconomics co-director Theo Notteboom, explains the scenarios on alliance formation in container shipping today. Four alliances are operational in the market: 2M, Ocean...
The european container system in 2014 Containers

The european container system in 2014

By Theo Notteboom With a total maritime container throughput of an estimated 101.5 million TEU in 2014, the European container port system crossed the 100 million TEU mark for the first time ever. Growth was particularly strong in the period 2005- 2007, with an average annual growth rate of 10.5%, compared to 6.8% in the...
Traffic decline in container ports: the exception or the new normal? Containers

Traffic decline in container ports: the exception or the new normal?

By Theo Notteboom Recently, Hamburg announced that container throughput in the Elbe port saw a decline of 6.8% in the first half of 2015 compared to the same period last year, mainly caused by a sharp decrease in the trade volumes with Russia and China. The container business is generally considered as a growth sector. Over the past...
Ports of call combinations on the Europe-Asia trade Containers

Ports of call combinations on the Europe-Asia trade

By Theo Notteboom When container shipping lines design a weekly service between Asia and North Europe, they have to decide how many and which ports of call to include in the schedule. On the North European side, they typically ensure they serve the biggest port regions. Therefore, almost all liner services on the North Europe – Far...
How dependent are north-european ports on containers? Containers

How dependent are north-european ports on containers?

By Theo Notteboom Discussions on port development, planning and competitiveness often tend to revolve around container flows. Quite a few ports around the world have developed some kind of 'container fetish', implying they have developed a very strong focus on container throughput. But how dependent are ports on container...
How dependent are west-med ports on containers? Containers

How dependent are west-med ports on containers?

By Theo Notteboom In last week's infographic, Theo Notteboom analysed the container dependency of major North-European ports. But how is the situation in southern Europe? How dependent are West-Mediterranean ports on container traffic? As before, there are three dimensions in the infographic. The vertical axis shows the container...
Focus on short sea shipping Featured

Focus on short sea shipping

Theo Notteboom, PortEconomics co-director, gave a presentation on 'Short sea shipping in motion: the contribution of academic research in the period 1980 - 2015' at the closing plenary session of the GPRA conference (Global Port Research Alliance) held in Hong Kong on 21 and 22 May 2015. The early 1990s saw a growing interest in...
Page 13 of 19...1112131415...
Weekly Timeline
Oct 2nd 12:27 PM
Thematic Area

Portgraphic: Top-15 EU container ports in H1 2025

Sep 18th 3:40 PM
Thematic Area

Portgraphic: fleet capacity (owned/chartered) of container shipping lines

Sep 12th 3:48 PM
Thematic Area

Investments and financing challenges of the EU’s port managing bodies; findings from a comprehensive survey

Aug 12th 2:18 PM
Thematic Area

Port reform: World Bank publishes the third edition of its port reform toolkit

Jul 21st 11:51 AM
Thematic Area

Evaluating customer satisfaction with clearing and forwarding agents: Kuwait Shuwaikh Port

Tweets by @PortEconomics
  • Containers
  • Cruise
  • EPP
  • Ports & COVID-19
  • Back to top
About PortEconomics

PortEconomics is a web-based initiative aiming to advance knowledge exchange on seaport studies. Established by maritime economists affiliated to academic institutions in Belgium, Greece and the Netherlands. It provides freely accessible research, education, information, and network-building material on critical issues of port economics, management and policies.

Additional Information
  • About
  • Login
  • Register
  • Edit Profile
  • Contact us
  • PortProfessionals
  • PortReport Series
  • Terms and Conditions
  • Cookie Policy
© PortEconomics 2025. All rights reserved.
Produced by PortEconomics
Manage Consent
To provide the best experiences, we use technologies like cookies to store and/or access device information. Consenting to these technologies will allow us to process data such as browsing behavior or unique IDs on this site. Not consenting or withdrawing consent, may adversely affect certain features and functions.
Functional Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes. The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
Manage options Manage services Manage {vendor_count} vendors Read more about these purposes
View preferences
{title} {title} {title}