Japanese Ports Lead Global Car Throughput With Strong Gains In 2023

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The monthly car throughput figures in the early part of this year confirm the trend that had already become apparent in mid-2021. Since the beginning of 2022, the monthly throughput figures in the ports monitored by ISL have remained between 1.6 million and 2 million vehicles, reports isl.org.

Annual results

The annual results of the ports that publish their handling results and are included in the ISL Port Data Base also point to a noticeable recovery, after exceptionally difficult years marked by the Covid-19 pandemic. Leading ports showed significant increases in global car throughput.

Only the ports of Bremen/Bremerhaven had to report a further negative result compared to the previous year. While car throughput here fell by 4% from 2021 to 2022, the following year 2023 even saw declines of over 10%.

Tokyo (more than 13.5 million vehicles in 2023) and Yokohama (12.2 million vehicles in 2023), by far the world’s largest ports in terms of car throughput, as well as Kobe (1.3 million vehicles in 2023), also in Japan and in 10th place, have stabilized their car throughput and are all showing a positive development, which in the port of Yokohama is very clearly above the average of +10.4% with an enormous increase of 21%.

Laem Chabang in Thailand and Kocaceli in Turkey also posted positive results. While Laem Chabang increased its car throughput by 21.5% from 1.25 million vehicles to 1.52 million vehicles in 2022, Kokaceli grew by enormous 36 % and achieved its best result ever with 1.58 million vehicles.

Minor importance fleet

The car carrier fleet and the RoRo fleet are of minor importance in terms of their share of the transport capacity of the global merchant fleet, at 0.6% and 0.4% dwt respectively, but are extremely important for the development of the global economy.

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Source: Isl.org