The latest statistics on activity at the Port of Beirut show an annual decrease of 15.03% in the revenues of the Port of Beirut (PoB) to $6.40M by October 2021, compared to last year’s $7.54M. We note that no later data on revenue are available as per Port of Beirut statistics.
By August 2022, total container activity including transshipment (TEU+TS) increased by a yearly 9.93% to stand at 466,009 twenty-foot equivalent unit (TEU); container activity (TEU) added 15.32% on a yearly basis to 375,869 TEU by August 2022, whereas transshipment activity (TS) dropped by 6.57% YOY to 91,054 TEU by the same period.
In more details, the transshipment volume of CMA CGM, one of the two major shipping lines operating at the Port of Beirut, decreased annually by 11.53% to stand at 68,673 TEU by August 2022. In contrast, transshipment volume of MSC, the other major line, added 2.41% YOY to 9,774 TEU by August 2022. Furthermore, the local volume of CMA CGM jumped substantially by 47.99% to reach 121,513 TEU; same for the local volume of MSC which increased by 41.06% to stand at 90,926 TEU by the month of August 2022.
Following the approval of 2022 budget by the Lebanese Parliament, the exchange rate that will be applied on customs will become 15,000 Lebanese pounds per USD (instead of 1507 LBP per USD). Therefore, the activity at Port of Beirut is expected to fall notably on all goods subject to customs at the higher dollar rate.
Yearly total container activity including transshipment (TEU+TS) in twenty-foot by August:
Source: PoB, BLOMINVEST