Saudi Arabia has climbed eight points to take over position 16 in the global ranking for container handling amounts published by the marine publication Lloyd’s List, based in London.
This occurs as the Kingdom keeps working to improve its ports and link up new marine routes in order to accomplish the objectives specified in the National Transport and Logistics Strategy.
According to Lloyd’s List, processing more than 10.43 million containers at its ports in 2022 will contribute to Saudi Arabia’s increase in international ranking, the Saudi Press Agency claimed.
The Minister of Transport and Logistics Services Saleh Al-Jasser said, “This qualitative progress of the Kingdom’s ports in handling the numbers of containers according to the Lloyd’s List report comes as a result of the continuous support and empowerment of His Highness the Crown Prince – may God protect him.
The Kingdom’s efforts to increase Saudi ports’ ability to handle more than 40 million standard containers yearly by 2030, he continued, are the cause of this.
The strategy also intends to boost the transport and logistics sector’s non-oil revenues to SR45 billion ($12 billion) annually by 2030, from its current contribution of 6% to the national gross domestic product in 2021.
The Kingdom has already made substantial progress toward reaching these goals by establishing six new logistical zones and nine new intercontinental shipping services in partnership with foreign and domestic businesses last year. These generated about SR4 billion in revenue.
Additionally, the Saudi Ports Authority, also known as Mawani, is responsible for programs that have helped Saudi Arabia’s investments in the industry reach almost SR17 billion, according to the SPA.
In a different ranking, the ports of the Kingdom climbed to the 16th spot in the Liner Shipping Connectivity Index of the UN Conference on Trade and Development in June.
Additionally, the Kingdom advanced significantly in the Logistics Performance Index of the World Bank, moving up 17 spots to claim the 38th spot in 2023.
When compared to its rankings of 55 in 2018 and 52 in 2016, this is a significant improvement.
Currently, Saudi Arabia has 97 maritime routes connecting to 348 ports all over the world.