Technical Efficiency of Container Terminal Operations in Southwestern Seaport in Nigeria (Published)
Containerization plays a crucial role in international trade. It promotes the oceanic business, generally pertinent to container terminals. Despite the various benefits of the container terminal to maritime trade and the economic development of nations with seaports, Nigerian ports are suffering from a progressive decline compared to other thriving ports in other parts of the globe. Hence, this study evaluates the technical efficiency of container terminal operations in southwestern seaport in Nigeria. Survey research design was adopted for this study in which Multi-stage sampling technique was used. Both primary and secondary data were collected from the annual report and questionnaire respectively from staff of the container terminal operators in Tincan Island Port Complex and Apapa Port Complex. The result from the findings showed that four factors influenced container terminal capacity and port performance. These include port charges, stevedoring operations, unserviceable cranes and ship calls. Also, the Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) findings showed that AP Moller Terminal, PCHS, and PTML have a crste, vrste, and scale efficiency of 1, indicating they are fully technically efficient under both constant and variable returns to scale. It was concluded that AP Moller Terminal, PCHS and PTML are the most efficient terminal in South-Western Ports in Nigeria. It was recommended that periodic training and retraining of staff handling modern equipment should be prioritized and also, increase in port charges by the terminal operators should be addressed to encourage freight forwarders to clear their cargo on time at the port.
Keywords: Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA), Operators, Technical efficiency, container terminal, containerization, seaport
Assessment of Container Terminal Operations in South-Western Ports in Nigeria (Published)
Containers, a global maritime trade influencer, have increased the importance of ports. Ports serve as an economic catalyst for revenue and employment. The importance of container transport cannot be overemphasized in international trade especially in Nigeria. Hence, it becomes expedients to assess the elements of container terminal capacity, analyse the trend of cargo throughput and as well determine the relationship between handling equipment and cargo dwell time in Western ports in Nigeria. The study adopts multistage sampling. Also, both primary and secondary data were collected from the staff of the container terminal operators in Tincan Island Port Complex and Apapa Port Complex and 347 respondents were chosen using Yamene formular. Furthermore, Descriptive statistics such as frequency table, line graph, bar charts were used to examine the elements of container terminal capacity, analyse the trend of cargo throughput. The inferential statistics such as regression analysis was used examines the relationship between thandling equipment and cargo dwell time. The result showed a decline in cargo throughput from 2019 to 2020, a trend that can be directly attributed to the COVID-19 pandemic. Also, it was shown that the coefficient of handling equipment is 0.725, indicating that for every unit increase in the handling equipment score, the cargo dwell time increases by 0.725 units. The t-value of 21.558 and a significance level of 0.000 signify that the handling equipment is a significant predictor of cargo dwell time. Based on the findings of the study, it was concluded that terminal space, handling equipment, daily stock and port labour were significant factors or elements of container terminal capacity. It was recommended that Nigerian Ports Authority should invest more on sustainable infrastructure and terminal operators and stevedoring company should train and retrain their staff on modern handling equipment.
Keywords: Cargo throughput, Container, Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA), container terminal, shipping, terminal operators
Container Terminal Yard Optimisation: A Case In Turkey (Published)
Due to the ever-changing nature of container terminals, fluctuations in storage capacity, and updates to vessel loading lists, the container yard can often become a hindrance to efficient terminal operations. One specific bottleneck frequently encountered in the stacking yard is referred to as yard clash. This phenomenon results in longer loading times for containers and is caused by the stacking of containers with the same loading time for different vessels within the same limited yard block and the limited availability of yard equipment. To address this issue, a binary integer optimization model was developed and implemented at a major container terminal in Turkey to minimize yard clashes. The results indicated a significant decrease of 92% in yard clashes during the loading of outbound containers, which in turn led to an increase of 2% in the total number of containers handled per vessel per hour.
Keywords: binary integer programming, container terminal, optimization, storage space allocation problem, yard clash