Cargo volume handled by Philippine ports grew 1.8% to 197.899 million metric tons (mt) in the first nine months of 2019 from 194.322 million mt in the same period in 2018, bolstered by growth in export cargoes.
Of the total, foreign cargoes accounted for 62% or 122.895 million mt, up 5.2% from 116.79 million mt in the first nine months of 2018, data from the Philippine Ports Authority (PPA) showed.
Import cargoes, which had a 60.2% share in the total foreign traffic, dropped 24% to 74.025 million mt from 97.474 million mt.
Export cargoes, meanwhile, increased 13% to 48.870 million mt from 43.123 million mt last year.
Domestic cargoes, which contributed 38% of the total, went down 3.2% to 75.004 million mt from 77.533 million mt.
In terms of regions, Luzon accounted for 54% of the total with 107.199 million mt, down 3.9% from the 111.582 million mt handled in the first three quarters of 2018.
Contributing 30% was Mindanao with 59.566 million mt, which was 4% higher than the 57.347 million mt last year. Visayas likewise grew, up 22.6% to 31.134 million mt from the previous 25.393 million mt.
In terms of containerized cargoes, Philippine ports serviced 5.846 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) from January to September 2019, up 5.3% from the 5.552 million TEUs logged in the same months last year.
Domestic containerized cargoes increased 4.4% to 2.365 million TEUs from 2.265 million TEUs, while foreign containers improved 6% to 3.481 million TEUs from 3.287 million TEUs.
Ship calls rose 4.6% to 365,439 vessels in the first nine months of 2019 from 349,492 vessels in the same period in 2018. Domestic ship calls grew 4.7% to 356,969 vessels from 340,913 vessels, while foreign ship calls declined 1.3% to 8,470 vessels from 8,579 vessels.
Passenger traffic went up 7.5% to 62.601 million in the first nine months of this year from 58.234 million in the same period last year. Embarking passengers increased 3.3% to 30.760 million from 29.77 million while the number of disembarking passengers jumped 12.8% to 31.675 million from 28.090 million. The number of cruise ship passengers, however, fell 55.4% to 166,509 from 374,096 previously.
Roll-on/roll-off (Ro-Ro) traffic increased 9.4% to 5.689 million from 5.199 million in the first nine months of 2018. Inward Ro-Ro traffic grew 9% to 2.843 million from 2.607 million while outward Ro-Ro traffic likewise climbed 10% to 2.845 million from 2.592 million. – Roumina Pablo