One of the themes from the recent Port Finance International’s Black Sea conference was Turkey’s development – which is helping to push other player’s plans onto the back burner.

Andreas Nigulis of Vector Port and Transport Solutions adds that he sees the plans for new container terminals in both Varna and Bourgas being ‘rethought’.

Turkey’s cargo and container throughout has managed a stead development, increasing by 86% to 5,743,455 teu over the last six years, and even when others were sliding from the downturn Turkish ports managed a rise of 1.7%.

Much of the story is inevitably transhipment. ‘DP World Constanta’s rise and fall is emblematic for the vulnerability of this traffic,’ Mr Nigulis explains. ‘Virtually 900,000 teu transhipment was handled in 2007 which dropped to under 200,000 teu in 2010’.

Three major port projects are currently in the planning and tender phase: Çandarlı Port, located in the Izmir area will be dedicated to container handling. The plan provides for two phases of 2m teu development each with, an option to bring capacity up to 12m teu.

Mersin Container Port is planned over five phases with an end design capacity of 11.4m teu.

Finally, Filyos, located on the Black Sea, is dedicated to iron ore, containers and oil with a capacity of 25m tons per year.