Freight traffic at Ukraine's seaport of Odessa between January and December 2015 jumped by 4.1% year-on-year and totaled 25,585,800 tonnes, the Port Authority statistics said.
The volume includes 22,261,600 tonnes of dry bulk cargo, which is 9.9% more than in the same period a year before. Shipments of liquid bulk cargo declined by 23.2% to 3,324,200 tonnes.
In the reporting period cargo volume growth was driven primarily by grain and ferrous metals. The port handled 8,615,440 tonnes of grain (+ 29.1%) and 6,358,200 tonnes (+43.1%) of ferrous metals. In the metals cargo segment the port of Odessa ranks first among other ports of the country with 35% of all steel products exported through the ports of Ukraine.
Containers traffic at the port fell by 10.2% year-on-year to 372,297 TEUs (vs 414,535 TEUs a year earlier).
Six of the 13 major stevedores at the port reported robust results for 2015. The leading operator in terms of volumes handled was Brooklyn-Kiev Ltd. (operator of Grain Harbor facilities) with 6,478,600 tonnes. The second leading company was HPK Ukraina (the operator of container terminal on Quarantine Mole) that handled 3,685,900 tonnes. Olimpex Coupe Int. (operates Berths 3-4 of Quarantine Mole facilities) ranks third with 2,903,600 tonnes.
Ukraine based Port of Odessa is one of the largest ports of the Black Sea-Azov basin. The major stevedore operating at the port is state-owned Odessa Commercial Sea Port. The port's throughput capacity is 14 million tonnes of dry bulk cargo and 14 million tonnes of liquid bulk a year. The Odessa Marine Passenger Terminal can accommodate 300-m-long vessels. In 2014 cargo throughput at the port of Odessa rose 6.1% to 24.5 million tonnes.