Hamburger Hafen und Logistik (HHLA) saw its container throughput drop by 10.6% year-on-year (YoY) due to the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic but insisted it had fared relatively well throughout the crisis.
In a statement accompanying the terminal operator’s financial results, Angela Titzrath, Chairwoman, said HHLA had “weathered the effects” of the pandemic.
“We will continue to reliably fulfil our responsibility as a service provider for Germany as an industrialised nation in 2021, too.
“This is something that consumers and companies alike can rely on. Regardless of the changing macroeconomic environment, we will decisively continue to pursue our transformation process in order to be able to fulfil our customers’ requirements even more efficiently and develop new growth areas.”
HHLA said the uncertain market conditions make it impossible to make a reliable forecast for coming year and that any performance would depend on the speed of the global recovery.
However, it did say it expects to see a moderate year-on-year increase for the Port Logistics subgroup, both in terms of container throughput and container transport, for the current financial year.
Revenue for Port Logistics fell by 6% in 2020 and its operating result fell by 46% due to the effects of the pandemic and various lockdown measures.
A moderate YoY revenue increase is also expected, after the operating result in the financial year 2020 was burdened by net provisions amounting to approximately $50.67 million (€43 million) for an efficiency programme in the Container segment.
