Port traffic grows by 3.6% in March, exceeding 47.6 million tonnes

• Passenger traffic grew by +51% during the month of March, totalling over 6 million people in the first quarter of the year.
• Solid bulks (+5.2%), conventional general cargo (+3.1%) and liquid bulks (+0.4%) grew during the first three months of the year compared to the same period in the previous year.
• New vehicle traffic through the ports reached 812,471 units (+41%) during the first quarter of the year.

24-04-2023 (Spanish State Ports Public Body). The freight traffic registered in the 46 ports of general interest of the State, which are managed by 28 Port Authorities and coordinated by Puertos del Estado, amounted to 47,616,630 tonnes during the month of March, which represents an increase of +3.6% compared with the same month in the previous year. Thus, 21 of the 28 Port Authorities experienced increases, with particularly significant advances in Alicante (+90.6%), Motril (+48.1%), Tarragona (+46.5%) and A Coruña (+37.5%). This figure palliates the weak start to the year, as the 134,467,440 tonnes recorded in the first quarter of 2023 reduce the difference compared to the previous year to -1.7%.

Most of the increase in traffic was driven by the +5.2% growth in solid bulks, which exceeded 8.3 million tonnes in March and now total 23.6 million tonnes for the first quarter of the year. Among the most prominent goods in this group are coal and petroleum coke, which with almost 6 million tonnes have grown by +70%, and cereals and their flours at 4.8 million tonnes, +16%.

Liquid bulks, with 8.3 million tonnes handled in March, already exceeded 44.4 million tonnes in the first quarter, growing by +0.4%. The products that grew the most were diesel oil (+11.3%), oils and fats (+13%) and other petroleum products (+9%).

General cargo, continued in March its trend of previous months, with containerised goods declining (-3.3%) and conventional goods continuing to grow (+8.6%). The main driver of this traffic is the movement of new vehicles which, with 812,471 units, grew by +41%. As a result, the quarterly total is close to 63 million tonnes, -5.1% lower than in 2022.

Ro-Ro traffic increased by +13.4% during March and now exceeds 17.6 million tonnes for the year to date, with +4.5% growth in the quarter.

Passenger traffic, for its part, took a quantitative leap in March, growing by +51%, and now totals more than 6 million passengers in the first quarter of the year. Although regular liner passenger traffic accounts for nearly 70% of the total, cruise passenger traffic has grown the most (+126%), exceeding 1.8 million people, confirming the forecasts for this year of exceeding pre-pandemic figures.