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INTERDISCIPLINARY JOURNAL OF CONTEMPORARY RESEARCH IN BUSINESS
3. Empirical Data
3.1 Share of Short Sea Shipping in EU 15
JANURAY 2011
VOL 2, NO 9
Short Sea Shipping (SSS) is accountable for 63% of the entire amount of goods transported by
sea in the EU-15 in the year of 2003, equivalent to 1.6 billion tones. The UK and Italy was
responsible for the largest share of cargo handled in Short Sea Shipping, equivalent to 342 and
302 million tons respectively. Total amount of Short Sea Shipping varied widely from one
country to another. Short Sea Shipping faced an upturn in all the EU-15 Member States from
2002 to 2003, but not in the United Kingdom. The Mediterranean and the North Sea had the
largest share of SSS, with 30% (491 million tones handled), and 27% (448 million tones
handled) respectively (XENELLIS, 2005).
Graph 1: SSS in total annual turnover of tonnage -million tones, 2003
Source: XENELLIS (2005)
The majority of sea shipping which took place in 2003 for each of the EU-15 countries and
Norway (above graph) was Short Sea Shipping. The share of SSS in the total seaborne
transport is particularly good in Finland (92%), Greece (86%), Denmark (83%) and Ireland
(80%). However, it is important to remember that these countries handle some of the largest
shares of national and international intra-EU-15 transport. In 2003 the United Kingdom
handled 342 million tons of cargo in Short Sea Shipping, responsible for 18% of total SSS in
the EU-15. It was followed by Italy and the Netherlands with 16% and 12% shares,
respectively (XENELLIS, 2005).
The amount of cargo handled by SSS transported from EU-15 ports to Mediterranean ports
amounted to 491 million tones, i.e. 30% of total SSS declared by the EU-15. The North Sea
followed close behind, with its ports handling 448 million tones. In contrast, the amount of
cargo handled by SSS in the Baltic Sea, together with cargo intended for or leaving ports in
the North Sea, accounted for almost half of the total assets declared by the EU-15 (47%). The
Black Sea accounted for only 5% of the EU-15 total SSS (XENELLIS, 2005).
A considerable share of the cargo handled by Mediterranean ports (42%) – 217 million tones –
was loaded or unloaded in Italian ports. In 2003, Italian ports also handled more goods loaded
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