Panamanian ports head Latin America league

This marks a 27% rise in the former and 37% growth in the latter.

Only one Brazilian port, Santos, made the list, taking third place with 2.71m teu, an increase of 20.5%.

Kingston, the Jamaican transhipment hub, came fourth with traffic of 1.89m teu, up 9.5% over 2009. Buenos Aires came fifth, with traffic up 22.5% to 1.73m teu.

For its part, Colombia is represented by Cartagena, whose traffic of 1.58m teu represented growth of nearly 28%. Mexico, similarly, has only one port in the top 10, that of Manzanillo, where throughput amounted to 1.5m teu, up 36%.

Callao, Peru, registered growth of 23.5% on traffic of 1.34m teu, although is on course to become one of the major hubs in the region in the coming years. Another port on the rise is Guayaquil, Ecuador, where ICTSI has boosted traffic to 1.09m teu, up 23.7% on the year.

Just one port in the top ten, Freeport in the Bahamas, showed a decline in traffic, down 16.7% to 1.08m teu.