Ever-expanding maritime trade activities on account of marine being the cheapest mode of container transportation will drive port equipment market share over the forecast timeframe. Additionally, the increasing number of port expansion and modernization projects to comply with the rising trade activities will also foster market growth.
Rapid increase in cargo traffic over last decade will augment the industry size over the predicted timeframe. Some of the top trends that will positively influence port equipment industry outlook are elaborated underneath.
Expansion of maritime industry
The international maritime industry is a major driver of the global economy, as it is responsible to carry around 90% of global trade shipments. The industry facilitates intercontinental trade, bulk transport of raw materials and import/export of manufactured goods and food supplies between the nations. The water way transportation will continue to expand owing to the benefit of competitive freight costs, further strengthening the industry prospects.
Reportedly the industry consists over 50,000 merchant ships which trade internationally carrying every kind of cargo across the globe. Over 150 nations are a part of it operated by more than a million seafarers. These figures are consistently expected to surge up with the reference to recently increasing ship building activities.
The Asia Pacific leads the global shipbuilding industry owing to the presence of major shipbuilding countries like China and South Korea. The high availability of shipbuilding infrastructure along with favoring government policies will augment shipbuilding industry in the region. Currently, South Korea enjoys highest ship building orders followed by China due to the presence of biggies like Hyundai Heavy Industries Co.
Factors like digitalization, e-commerce and the implementation of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) are equally expected to foster the maritime industry growth. Growing e-commerce complemented by the digitalization of maritime transport will provide a boost to the seaborne trade volumes. China’s Belt and Road Initiative, an ambitious plan to restructure the global trade infrastructure will also fuel the shipping and maritime trade.
According to UNCTAD (United Nations Conference on Trade and Development), the international maritime trade will rise over 3.5% annually from 2018 to 2023. The ever-expansion of maritime industry will create requirements to modernize the existing port infrastructure and develop new ports. Such aspects will further create new opportunities to deploy port equipment, thus helping to drive port equipment industry size.
Rising cargo volumes at the ports
Majority of ports across the world are witnessing an upsurge in cargo volumes, which will require advanced cargo equipment for efficient operations. This may lead to increasing adoption of automated technologies like automated guided vehicles (AGVs) and automated stacking cranes (ASCs). This type of port equipment offers enhanced capabilities for automated cargo movement, further cutting down the loading and unloading time at the dock yard.
The rise in cargo volume at sea ports has been helping countries to strengthen their economy with more trading opportunities. For instance, New Zealand’s Centre Port gained high profit in 2018-19 as compare to the year 2017-18 mainly due to surge in cargo volume. The vehicle volumes had hit a new high of 28,099 units along with a record of handling one million tons of petroleum in successive years.
Similarly, India’s 12 major ports recorded 2.90 percent growth in cargo handling during 2018-19. According to IPA (Indian Ports Association) the increased demand from various sectors including coal, containers, fertilizers, and petroleum products including oil &lubricant resulted in this rise of cargo volume.
Supply and demand play a key role for the maritime industry, based on which the cargo volume rises or reduces. Rising cargo volumes will drive increasing adoption of port equipment, thus will strengthen the port equipment market trends over the forecast period.
Expansion and modernization of ports
Increasing cargo traffic has been promoting port authorities to expand the existing port capacity for improving management and operations. Port expansion improves the overall efficiency of the port and attracts a larger number of vessels, bringing additional foreign exchange to the country.
Recently the port of Virginia completed its expansion project after two years of development. The port is now 800 feet longer, and ready to accommodate three ultra-large container ships at once, hence decreasing the waiting time to get docked. The increasing number of port expansion projects will help foster the demand for advanced cargo handling equipment.
Apart from expansion of the ports, the modernization or replacement of the existing port equipment will also help to increase port equipment market share. Moreover, high performance, lower lifecycle costs, and enhanced productivity offered by modern cranes will significantly propel port equipment industry size. Technology that improves safety is developing more rapidly than ever before owing to the changing safety regulations. Modernization will not only help to comply with current safety regulations but also reduce the risk of downtime, injuries or damage to facilities, materials, or products.
There has been rising adoption of alternative fuel powered port equipment, owing to the lower operation costs and reduced environmental impacts. Port authorities of many countries are looking to replace their existing outdated cranes with the new generation hybrid cranes, owing to better fuel efficiency and lower greenhouse gas emissions. Implementation of new generation diesel engines running on ultra-low-sulfur diesel to power forklifts will propel diesel port equipment market size over the forecast timeframe.
Rising shipping activities in international water border coupled with increasing cargo volume will lead to excessive loads at the dock yards. Therefore, the need to enhance port operations will escalate port equipment industry size. Furthermore, technological advancement of the port equipment in order to sustain efficiency requirements will correspondingly support port equipment market growth. According to a research report by Global Market Insights, Inc., port equipment market size is expected to exceed USD 9 billion by 2025.