The association between ports and manufacturing has constantly evolved through technological and economic changes. Prior to containerization, there were strong linkages between ports and heavy industrial activities, and indirectly with lighter forms of manufacturing.
Many ports were a combination of commercial and warehousing activities requiring a large amount of labour, while other ports focused on transshipping bulk commodities with the related heavy industrial activities.
Manufacturing activities are influenced in their locational choices by three main categories of factors with each activity having different considerations for ports.
