Meanwhile, the Valencia case illustrates Mr Brown’s viewpoint that shipping lines are becoming increasingly involved in port operations.

In Valencia, among three large container ports in Spain with 2.7m teu moving in 2007, Mediterranean Shipping Corporation (MSC) recently opened its own dedicated container terminal at Fangos Wharf.MSC’s facility lies directly across from Maritima Valencia’s newly expanded public-use facilities at the Príncipe Felipe & East Wharves, which has benefited as lines such as CSCL have made Valencia a hub.

Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation, a wellknown provider of project-based infrastructure funding, provided €130m ($171m) of debt for the Valencia Container Terminal in 2005.

And, at the opposite reaches of the port funding spectrum,several ports in China, where trade flows have grown at around 20% per annum in recent years – easily double the gross domestic product growth of 10% – are looking at the ultimate privatisation technique: the initial public offering of listed shares. Look for shares in the ports of Qingdao,Dalian and Tianjin to be trading on the Hong Kong Exchange within the year.