The Gothenburg Port Authority has decided to freeze its port tariff. As a result, the tariff for 2016 will remain at the 2015 level.
Magnus Kårestedt, CEO of Port of Gothenburg, said: “Our aim behind this move is to reinforce the growth of industry, shipping and the port.”
All ships calling at the Port of Gothenburg pay a port charge based on the ship's gross weight and classification. The port charge is used to finance, for example, fairway maintenance, traffic information systems and safety at the port.
Magnus Kårestedt continued: “Shipping costs become transport costs for industry. By doing our utmost to keep the port charge down, we can contribute to maintaining a strong cluster of shipping companies in Gothenburg and a broad range of services to key markets.
“We can see that leaving the Port Tariff unchanged is one of the means that we can employ to really boost growth. We also hope that other parties in the transport chain do everything in their power to keep costs to a minimum. The state fairway charges, for example, don't exist throughout the rest of Europe and simply make transport more expensive for Swedish industry.”
Ships that demonstrate good environmental performance will receive a discount on the port charge at the Port of Gothenburg.
Two indexes are used as a basis for calculating the environmental discount – the Environmental Ship Index, which is used at many ports throughout the world, and the Clean Shipping Index, which is an environmental index where the cargo owners rate ships and shipping companies. Ships that switch to running on liquefied natural gas, LNG, receive a further discount.
Fact file: The Port of Gothenburg is the largest port in the Nordic region. 30 per cent of Swedish foreign trade passes through the Port of Gothenburg as well as 60 per cent of all container traffic.
The Port of Gothenburg is the only port in Sweden with the capacity to receive the world's largest container vessels and has the broadest range of shipping routes within and outside Europe. The 25 rail shuttles that depart each day mean that companies throughout Sweden and Norway have a direct, environmentally smart link to the largest port in the Nordic region. The Port of Gothenburg has terminals for oil, cars, ro-ro, containers and passengers.
