MARITIME INDUSTRY IS AS STRONG AS A STONE
The 5th edition of the International Maritime Congress was held on 8–9 June in Szczecin. The congress serves as a discussion and meeting platform for maritime economy representatives. During the meeting we could hear about the infrastructure investment plan which involves spending a billion zlotys (ca. €250 million) on the ports in Szczecin and Świnoujście during the 2014-2020 EU funding period.
This is an important information as only the port in Antwerp records higher sea handling than the port in Szczecin. Consequently, the Szczecin port has become the second largest European transshipment centre of granite blocks! In the first five months of 2017 dockers from Szczecin-Świnoujście Port Complex handled 10.5 mln tonnes of cargo (9% increase as compared to the same period last year). Consequently, the board of the ports predicts that this year may be another record-high year in terms of bulk cargo and container transshipment.
Let us also add that recently both ports have been also on the list of the leading natural stone transshipment ports in Europe. If it comes to the distribution of powers in particular Baltic countries, Poland has gone up from the fifth to the second position within the past 20 years and is now higher on the ranking list than Scandinavian ports.
Poland usually gets granites from India, China. the RSA, Brazil and Spain. Stone arrives in blocks which weigh from 4 to 40 tonnes. They are usually heavier than declared. The stone goes mostly to the internal market and a part of raw material is transported by road to Germany.