Port of Rotterdam Reports Productive Year

According to the provisional figures the port of Rotterdam in 2002 handled 321,9 million tons of goods. This result nearly equals the record of 2000 (322,4 mln tons). CEO Willem Scholten called the result "a pleasant surprise". "In the present economic circumstances a stable level of throughput would have seemed more logical, but our second half year was extremely good. In containers and oil products even the best ever". Up were ores and scrap (+7%), oil products (+27%), roll on/roll off (+8%), containers (+7%, from 6,1 to 6,5 mln TEU). Down crude oil (-2%), other liquid bulk goods (-3%), coal (-3%), agricultural bulk goods (-19%), other dry bulk goods (-9%), other general cargo (-11%). The full press release in English will be issued coming Monday.