14 December 2018
Members of the European Port Forum – i.e. representatives of the EU Member States, of the industry and the European Commission (DG MOVE, DG COMP and DG MARE) - met on December 14th for the third plenary meeting.
The meeting started with an introductory statement by MoS Coordinator, Professor Bodewig, and the formal adoption of the Terms of Reference for the Subgroups on "Sustainable Ports" and "Ports as hubs for blue growth".
Participants had then the opportunity to be updated about the answers provided by the Legal services of the European Commission to a number of questions raised by Member States regarding different articles of the Port Services Regulation.
Article 19 and Article 16 of the Ports Regulation were discussed by the meeting participants. In the afternoon, the consultants in charge of the study on the market potential of ports and inland waterways provided an update and answered the questions of attendees.
The Q&As session was followed by presentations about good practices in the sector. The Baltic Ports Organisation’s representative detailed the offer of LNG Bunkering in the Baltic while FEPORT Secretary General, Ms Lamia Kerdjoudj-Belkaid, explained how TIC 4.0 (Terminal Industry Committee 4.0) and its ongoing and future work will contribute to improve the efficiency and sustainability of port operations (please see above in the newsletter).
During the last part of the meeting, Olaf Merk, Administrator at ITF OECD presented the recently released report on the impact of alliances in container shipping.