Securing public interests in seaports

1
Securing public interests in seaports

• Dr. P.W. de Langen
• Erasmus University Rotterdam

2
Analyzing public interests

• Many studies have addressed the issue of public
  interests in seaports.
• However, in many of these studies, it is assumed
  that public port authorities can effectively
  secure public interests.
• Due to commercialization, this is no longer the
  case.
• Furthermore, public ownership is often not an
  effective method to secure public interests.
• Thus, need for identification of public interests
  and alternative arrangements to secure these
  public interests

3
Seven public interests

• Nautical safety
• Market access to seaports
• (Fair) competition in seaports
• Port planning
• Land use in ports
• Quality and continuity of landlord
• Effective governance of the port cluster

4
Arrangements to secure public interests

• Two approaches
• Regulation of private industries
• Ownership/responsibility of public organization.
• Both forms are effective for different public
  interests

5
Empirical analysis how are public interests
secured in seven countries

• Not always relevant
• Different institutional position of PA

6
Safety

• Safety regulation in place in all ports
• Main issue position of pilots

7
Market Access
8
Fair competition
9
Port planning
10
Land use in ports
11
Continuity of landlord
12
Effective governance of the port (cluster)

• Need to organization that invests to overcome
  collective action problems
• Public PAs make such investments (Antwerp ICT,
  Hamburg marketing, Rotterdam innovation etc).
• Private port companies (Felixstowe, MDHC) hardly
  do so. This leads to other forms of cooperation
  (Mersey Maritime, Felixstowe port users
  association), but less investments to address
  CAPs.

13
Can PAs be privatised?
14
Conclusions

• Various public interests in seaports
• Some of these cannot be effectively secured
  through PA market access, competition, nautical
  safety.
• Only convincing argument for public PAs more
  effective governance of port (both overall and
  for port planning).
• More autonomous PA requires additional policies
  to secure public interests.