Traffic up at Zeebrugge

The Belgian port of Zeebrugge has bucked the downturn to post a volume increase of 1.5% for the first three quarters of this year.

However, the ports ro-ro business slumped 27% and new cars were down by 45%. In contrast, box traffic grew by more than 10% to 17.8m tonnes.

Dry bulk tonnage also decreased by 18.5%, while liquid bulk increased by 32.6%, thanks mainly to increased volumes of liquefied natural gas. Conventional freight traffic rose 1%.