A step too far, asks The Strategist
The Port of Antwerp made an interesting announcement last month, namely that it “aims to strengthen its position on a world scale” and “for this purpose the Antwerp Port Authority has opted to develop activities beyond Europe, especially in growth regions with the potential to generate cargo for Antwerp.
And that it will do this through a new subsidiary Port of Antwerp International (PAI), the successor to Antwerp Port Consultancy (APC).
The envisaged role of PAI will, in addition to the traditional training and consultancy activities traditionally undertaken by APC, include involvement in management support, for developing, operating or even investing in foreign ports or networks of ports. Specifically, the Antwerp Port Authority states: “PAI will put the Port Authority’s maritime foreland policy into practice by acquiring stakes in foreign port projects with a reliable rate of return, located in strategically important regions such as the Middle East, India, Sub-Saharan Africa and Brazil.” And the Authority notes that over the next few months it will recruit the personnel required for PAI to undertake this role.
It is a fact of life that port authorities have traditionally had a global perspective – it is necessary to generate cargo flows, identify customers and their requirements. When it comes to the idea of actually investing overseas, though, only a few authorities have followed this road and probably only one made it work on a large scale: the Port of Singapore Authority (PSA). Even for PSA, however, it necessitated a massive learning curve and some hard lessons were learnt en route, more than one entailing withdrawing from a port concession.
There is also the irony that while an authority like the Port of Antwerp is now one that conforms to the landlord port model – where it has distanced itself from front-line port operations – it is now setting up a subsidiary whereby it will effectively have an involvement in this theatre of activity. Is, therefore, such a move a step too far? Does it present too much of a contradiction to its central role?
While it is clear to see a role for an entity such as Antwerp in the transfer of expertise to ports, it seems harder to justify the step into port investment. It seems an improbable move given that on the one hand there is now a broader base of port investor available to tap into and on the other that it entails a distinct shift in philosophy compared with its existing modus operandi.