PortStudies
PortStudies
PortStudies
Evaluating customer satisfaction with clearing and forwarding agents: Kuwait Shuwaikh Port
PortEconomics member Theo Notteboom and Ahmed Alsalfiti (University of Antwerp and Antwerp Management School, Belgium) investigated the influence of service quality on customer satisfaction with clearing and forwarding C&F agents using the SERVQUAL model and their portstudy has been published in the Scientific Journal of Maritime Research. C&F agents play a crucial role in facilitating the clearance and delivery of goods for businesses, and their service quality is heavily dependent on port operations. The authors' research...
PortStudies
Digital technologies for efficient and resilient sea-land logistics
PortEconomics member Francesco Parola, during the annual conference of the International Association of Maritime Economists, held 25-27 June 2025, in Bergen, Norway, delivered a presentation on “Digital Technologies for Efficient and Resilient Sea-Land Logistics: IT-Based Decision Support Systems to Manage Highway Capacity of Major Gateway Ports”. Francesco examines the crucial role of road transport in port competitiveness and emphasises the necessity for improved coordination between maritime and inland logistics....
PortStudies
Stakeholders’ attitudes toward container terminal automation
Do you want to understand better why fewer than 80 container terminals are automated? PortEconomics members Theo Notteboom, Thanos Pallis & Geraldine Knatz examine stakeholders' attitudes toward container terminal automation, aiming to place terminal automation as an innovation trajectory in the broader context of stakeholder relations management. More specifically, their port study: Position terminal automation as an innovation trajectory within the broader context of stakeholder relations...
PortStudies
Toward green container liner shipping: joint optimization of heterogeneous fleet deployment, speed optimization, and fuel bunkering
Container liner shipping companies, under the international shipping carbon reduction indicators proposed by the International Maritime Organisation, must transform two key aspects: technology and operations. PortEconomics member Theo Notteboom, along with Yuzhe Zhao, Zhongxiu Peng (Dalian Maritime University), Jingmiao Zhou (Dalian University of Foreign Languages), Yiji Ma (Dalian Maritime University) defined a green liner shipping problem (GLSP) that integrates the deployment of a heterogeneous fleet, speed determination, and fuel...
PortStudies
Investments and financing challenges of the EU’s port managing bodies; findings from a comprehensive survey
The ‘port managing body (PMB)’ plays a central role in the development of the port. Public funding for investment projects of the port managing bodies is common in the EU and most other countries.PortEconomics member Peter de Langen adds to the body of knowledge on port investments and financing challenges with an analysis of data from two surveys that were carried in 2018 and 2023.This analysis yields the following conclusions. First, the PMBs in the EU have shifted their investments, in response to changing investment drivers. The...
PortStudies
Container alliance strategies, market concentration and equality: A dynamic time warping clustering approach
In a recent study published in the scholarly journal Transport Policy, Richard Borggreve and PortEconomics member Gordon Wilmsmeier examine the evolving strategies of container shipping alliances and their implications for market concentration and equality across trade routes. The study introduces Dynamic Time Warping (DTW), a technique traditionally applied in time series analysis, to cluster global trade routes based on alliance deployment patterns. This approach enables the researchers to uncover temporal similarities and shifts in...
PortStudies
Optimizing Asia–Europe container network: The Suez Canal and Cape of Good Hope routes in a changing world
The development of an approach for evaluating various maritime transportation routes in light of ongoing disruptions and evolving global factors, including changes in demand, fluctuations in fuel prices, geopolitical shifts, and environmental considerations is the aim of the latest portstudy of PortEconomics member Pierre Cariou along with Sadeque Hamdan (Bangor University), Dominique Feillet (Univ Clermont Auvergne), Ali Cheaitou (University of Sharjah) and Nadjib Brahimi (Rennes School of Business) For each alternative route,...
PortStudies
Seaports in a tense geopolitical environment: key agents or sitting ducks?
In an increasingly uncertain world, seaports are no longer just logistical hubs facilitating global trade—they are becoming geopolitical focal points, caught between strategic interests, economic dependencies, and global power struggles. The geo-economic and geopolitical landscape has a major impact on seaports, which have limited control over these external factors. Geopolitical objectives and policies also have a significant impact on the strategies and operational decisions of port users. Meanwhile, the developments over the past...
PortStudies