Good for Business, Latvia, Port, Transport

Bulk cargos, which dominated in Latvian ports in January-June this year, grew 20.1% year-on-year to 18.21 million tons. Handling of coal increased by 35.2% to 10.387 million tons, chemical cargos fell 9.8% to 1.491 million tons, and woodchip cargos rose 23.6% to 794,800 tons.

Reloading of liquid cargos fell 10.5% year-on-year to 10.185 million tons in January-June 2017, with oil products making up the largest amount, or 9.77 million tons, which was a 10.5% drop from the first six months in 2016.

The turnover of general cargos grew 7.4% year-on-year to 5.594 million tons in January-June 2017. These cargos included 2.209 million tons of container cargo, up 14.3%, 1.606 million tons of timber, down 6.5%, and 1.515 million tons of roll on/roll off cargo, up 11.2%.

Riga was the leading Latvian port by cargo turnover in January-June this year, having reloaded 17.512 million tons of cargo, which was 4.1% less than in the first six months of 2016. The port of Ventspils followed with 12.373 million tons of cargo reloaded in January-June 2017, up 23.4% year-on-year, and the port of Liepaja was third with 3.273 million tons of cargo, up 21.9% from January-June 2016.

Skulte led Latvia's small ports by cargo turnover in January-June 2017, as it reloaded 440,600 tons at a 28.4% rise year-on-year. Mersrags followed with 226,000 tons, down 10.8%, and Salacgriva was third with 135,300 tons, down 13.4%.

All small Latvian ports together handed 830,300 tons of cargos in the six months of this year, up 6.4% from the respective period last year.

In the first six months of 2016, the Latvian ports reloaded 31.756 million tons of cargo.