ESPO’s PORTOPIA project reaches conclusion

Attendees at the PORTOPIA Final Event conference, which was held in Brussels in November, were presented with details of the EU-funded port performance initiative’s discoveries and accomplishments.

These included a new data service cloud and a digitalised ‘Rapid Exchange System’ port throughput platform, as well as analysis of port governance trends.

The event was a chance for PORTOPIA’s coordinators and participating ports to reflect on the venture’s four-year transition and consider its next moves.

The project initially came about following calls by the European Commission for greater comprehension of the European ports industry’s collective performance.

“For those involved in the PORTOPIA project, this has been quite a journey and not an easy task,” said Richard Ballantyne, chief executive of the British Ports Association.

“It has brought a wide variety of ports and associations together to collaborate and explore what in the way of performance benchmarking is possible in a competitive port environment.

“The challenge will now be to encourage ports to participate and feed into the new ‘digitalised’ ESPO Rapid Exchange System and make use of the new environmental performance tool and governance analysis,” he added.

The conference was held alongside the 2017 presentation of the ESPO Award, which focuses on ports’ societal integration.

Guadeloupe Ports Caraïbes beat a number of ports to win the accolade, which this year had a theme of ‘Art and Cultural involvement of the port’, with its ‘Port’Art’ project, aimed to appeal to a ‘grassroots audience’ and focus on everyday challenges faced by the port and its community.