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Chapter 6 Port Governance in Italy
CHAPTER 6 PORT GOVERNANCE IN ITALY Marisa A. Valleri, Maria Lamonarca and Paola Papa ABSTRACT After an overview of the administrative evolution of Italian port governance, this chapter examines the main three variables – environment, strategy and structure – and their relationships, according to the Matching Framework. The main outcomes show that the recent privatisation process is still far from an optimisation of port management, since some structural and bureaucratic constraints prevent Italian ports from benefiting from the positive environmental dynamics. Some Italian ports, indeed, are taking advantage of the recovered centrality of the Mediterranean area in the maritime flows and from strategic foreign investments.
1. INTRODUCTION The recent changes in maritime economics and, in particular, in port economics, modified the role of ports which are now considered fundamental links in the global logistic chain, able to produce innovative transport services in a more or less competitive way. These changes also focused attention on the institutional and managerial assets, with the aim of detecting governance structures that enable ports to be more competitive and to acquire the right amount of flexibility to adapt to market changes, in order to seize the arising opportunities (Brooks, Button, & Nijkamp, 2002). Devolution, Port Governance and Port Performance Research in Transportation Economics, Volume 17, 139–153 Copyright r 2007 by Elsevier Ltd. All rights of reproduction in any form reserved ISSN: 0739-8859/doi:10.1016/S0739-8859(06)17006-7
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In particular, this chapter aims at analysing the evolution of laws and of the management of assets at Italian ports. Such analysis will focus on the recent legislative and managerial developments in the Italian port policy, using the Matching Framework (Baltazar & Brooks, 2001) as a reference scheme. This permits us to relate the three fundamental variables (environment, strategy and structure) of an organisation as a port, with the aim of drawing conclusions about the current performance of the devolution efforts in the Italian port sector.
2. THE ITALIAN PORT SYSTEM Italy’s irregular 8,000 km coastline favoured the development of a number of ports. Nonetheless, the prevalence of mountains and hills longitudinally crossing the peninsula has always constituted an obstacle to the implementation of easy connections between ports and their hinterland. There are over 300 ports in Italy, considering also exclusively tourist and fishery ports. Maritime ports, which originate an activity of goods and/or passenger traffic, no matter how little, and are therefore functional to the national transport system, number about 100 (see Fig. 6.1). Italian Law no. 84/94 (Italian port reform law no. 84 of 28 January, 1994) divided ports into categories and classes. Category I includes ports for the military defence and security of the Nation; category II includes commercial ports, which, in turn, are divided into three classes: class I (ports of international economic relevance), class II (ports of national economic relevance) and class III (ports of regional and interregional economic relevance). The same law determined the prominence of some ports belonging to one of the first two classes of category II, there constituting port authorities. Initially, there were 18 ports (Ancona, Bari, Brindisi, Cagliari, Catania, Civitavecchia, Genoa, La Spezia, Leghorn, Marina di Carrara, Messina, Naples, Palermo, Ravenna, Savona, Taranto, Trieste and Venice) but the number increased to 24 (including also Piombino, Gioia Tauro, Salerno, Olbia – Golfo Aranci, Augusta and Trapani), following further Decrees of the President of the Republic, as paragraph 8 of art. 6 of the above-mentioned law determines that other port authorities could be constituted if an increase in the volume of the traffic of goods not lower than 3 million tons per year, or 200,000 TEUs, was recorded over three years. Table 6.1 shows the recent evolution of goods and container transport in the main Italian ports. In particular, in the four-year period under consideration, a total growth in the sector of goods was recorded, amounting to
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Trieste Venice Ravenna Genoa Savona Marina di Carrara La Spezia Leghorn
Ancona
Piombino
Civitavecchia Bari Brindisi
Olbia
Naples Salerno Taranto
Gioia Tauro Cagliari Palermo Trapani Catania
Messina
Augusta
Fig. 6.1.
The Italian Port Authorities.
slightly less than 6 percent, due to the fact that most ports under evaluation showed a positive trend. It is the container sector, however, that shows the most significant growth (amounting to 26 percent between 2000 and 2003), with the dominant position of the terminals in Gioia Tauro, which in 2003 moved about 3.1 million TEUs, Genoa 1.6 million TEUs, and La Spezia 1.0 million TEUs, followed by Taranto 0.7 million TEUs. It is evident that the positive trend is mainly due to the development of predominantly transshipment ports (Gioia Tauro, Taranto and Cagliari).
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Table 6.1.
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Goods and Container Transport in the Major Italian Ports (2000–2003).
Ports
Ancona Augusta Bari Brindisi Cagliari–Sarroch Catania Civitavecchia Genoa Gioia Tauro La Spezia Leghorn Marina di Carrara Messina-Milazzo Naples Olbia–G.Aranci Palermo Piombino Ravenna Salerno Savona-Vado Taranto Trieste Venice Total
Goods (million tons)
Container (‘000 TEUs)
2000
2001
2002
2003
2000
2001
2002
2003
11.15 31.30 3.45 8.05 30.32 2.64 9.85 50.80 30.82 16.52 24.58 3.38 10.62 14.78 5.76 5.22 10.38 22.68 3.83 13.20 33.88 47.61 28.18
13.72 31.31 3.50 8.92 29.04 2.65 8.84 50.18 29.61 15.85 24.66 3.15 13.95 16.72 5.20 5.27 9.00 23.81 4.45 13.27 34.53 49.14 28.81
12.51 31.59 3.61 8.74 31.60 2.74 9.35 51.75 25.59 18.20 25.33 3.27 15.73 18.63 5.70 4.91 8.171 23.93 4.97 13.15 34.67 47.17 29.55
9.57 29.28 3.93 10.17 34.07 4.13 8.43 53.71 25.45 19.79 25.73 3.06 17.56 19.41 5.92 5.41 8.67 24.91 7.08 13.41 37.51 46.00 30.13
84 – 1 7 22 13 13 1,501 2,653 910 501 11 – 397 – 17 – 181 276 37 3 17 206
90 – 2 6 35 11 16 1,527 2,488 975 502 9 – 431 – 15 – 158 321 51 198 19 201
94 – 12 1 74 13 21 1,531 3,009 975 520 10 – 444 – 11 – 161 375 55 472 17 185
76 – 24 2 314 14 25 1,606 3,149 1,007 541 9 – 433 – 15 – 160 417 54 658 13 120
419.00
425.58
430.861
443.33
7,051
7,280
8,226
8,908
Source: Federtrasporto. (2004). Statistiche – Trasporto marittimo.
All in all, the national network of goods flow indicates three large geographic areas having different functions and vocations: the Northeast one (Northern Adriatic), the Northwest (Northern Thyrrenian) and South. Northeastern ports are distant from the main ship routes between the Suez Canal and the Straits of Gibraltar. The prevailing traffic in these ports, therefore, is trans-Adriatic and intra-Mediterranean. On the other hand, Northwestern ports, although also distant from the main routes of crossing of the Mediterranean basin enjoy the attraction effect of the tight port network formed by Marseille, Barcelona and Valencia. The weak point here seems to be the link with other transport modes, complementary to the maritime mode. In fact, road mobility is hampered by the location of the
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port inside towns or in their vicinity, whereas railway mobility is limited by the nearness of the Alps or the Appennines. Southern ports, however, have an optimal location compared with the Gibraltar–Suez direction. Nonetheless, they are heavily affected by the lack of internal links with the national and European infrastructure network. To increase its share in the European port industry, the Italian port system therefore needs to overcome limitations concerning ports such as infrastructure (in relation to the services offered, the equipped areas, etc.) and links with the hinterland.
3. THE EVOLUTION OF THE ITALIAN PORT LAWS Italian laws have historically considered port services and activities as public goods. The 1942 code of navigation achieved the maximum functionality towards public interest in the activities in this sector and confirmed a high level of intrusion of administrative power on those interested in maritime navigation and related activities. On the one hand, it emphasised ports as belonging to the maritime state and, on the other, the availability of port services to the public. The character of state property is related to both the function of port areas and to the ownership of the port by the Public Administration, with the consequent imposition of bonds and organisational models also on the private actors operating in the port. In time, the overlapping of competences of the various local and central administrations interested in port activities caused government to look for autonomous forms of management that allowed for a better exploitation and development of the port. With this aim, it was necessary to speed up the adoption of provisions, and this only seemed possible through the centralisation of many functions and activities into a single, local and autonomous body – the State. The need for such a new organisation was first recognised in 1903 with the creation of the Consortium of the Port of Genoa (Law 12 February 1903, no. 50). It was an autonomous consortium whose aim was, through the special funds it had been endowed with, to see to the implementation of public works, management and the coordination of port services. The constitution of the Consortium of Genoa, just like the successive constitutions of other port organisations in some of the major ports, met the need to transfer management tasks, implementation and maintenance of port works, rather than the real will to decentralise functions and powers.
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When the Fascists were in power, port organisations were dissolved, in line with the centralising principle, typical of the regime. Only after World War I were these organisations resumed, having wider functions ranging from administration (planning of port works, concession of maritime state property, discipline of port works, authority over tariffs) to entrepreneurship, aimed at managing port operations and service supply. Where such organisations were not present, the Minister of Merchant Marine entrusted various actors with the management of ports, such as volunteer consortia among local entities, special branches of the Chambers of Commerce, businesses and mixed consortia, and private businesses. The remaining ports were directly administered by the state through local maritime authorities. The level of autonomy was different in different ports. If the ports administered by maritime authorities were directly controlled by the state, those managed by port consortia could enjoy a certain level of financial autonomy. Important support for the process of liberalisation of the port sector (Cullinane & Song, 2002) came from the substantial changes that occurred in the international maritime economy, in particular, the development of container traffic and the growth of intermodal transport. Compared with such revolutions, the organisational assets of Italian ports appeared more and more inadequate. The demand for port services was changing, requiring better and better performance. The need to overcome the prevailing institutional model’s difficulty in adapting to new demands brought about an intense and prolonged debate about the possible lines of reform of port regulation. In particular, during the 1980s, many reorganisation proposals for the port sector were formulated. Among these, a document by Confindustria dated 1984 must be underlined; it featured the separation of the activity of control carried out by the port organisation from the organisation of port services, which had to be entrusted to business-like managers. The document also suggested creating public–private mixed societies for the activities of planning, execution and management of port areas in order to promote an increase in competitiveness for Mediterranean ports (Valleri & Van de Voorde, 1992). Summarising, Italian ports before 1994 were characterised by The bureaucratic presence of the Public Administration; A strong connection between administrative and entrepreneurial activities by port organisations; A regulation of port activities imposing bonds and organisational models also to private operators, in virtue of concessions and/or authorisations;
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The copresence of different models of management in different ports; The monopoly on the supply of manpower in port operations in favour of the workers of port companies (art. 110, last paragraph of the code on navigation).
4. THE PORT REFORM The basic principle of the Framework Law no. 84/1994 on the ‘‘Reorganisation of legislation on ports’’ is to separate the development of port operations and the task of controlling and directing port activities. Actually, the former are carried out by authorised private port enterprises, whereas the latter are provided by port authorities, as constituted in the main Italian ports, which discipline and monitor the carrying out of port operations. Briefly, port authorities replace port organisations, whereas maritime authorities, which are present in every port in accordance with the Italian Navigation Code and other special laws, carry out a policy and safety role as well as those administrative duties that do not come under the port authorities’ competence. Maritime authorities have specifically the following functions: coast guard, search and sea rescue; safety of navigation; maritime police (the regulating of traffic in and out of the port’s waters, berthing and maritime traffic; organisation of ancillary services and relevant tariffs; inquiries and investigations on navigation accidents); naval property and administrative regulation of vessels; and marine environment safety and protection. Where port authorities were not constituted, only local maritime authorities discipline and survey on the carrying out of port functions. Finally, a small number of ports are managed by special port enterprises, which are peripheral structures of the Chambers of Commerce, as expressly indicated by law 84 (Table 6.2). There are four Special Enterprises of the Chambers, two of which (Porto Torres and Agrigento) are exclusively dedicated to activities of promotion, whereas the other two (Monfalcone and Chioggia) carry out production services, drawing income from managing stores and mechanical structures under convention, as well as from the rents of port buildings and services. The Port Authority is a public body endowed with legal status, with administrative autonomy that is subjected to restrictions imposed by the
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Table 6.2. Type Port authorities
Maritime authorities
Special port enterprises
Port Structure in Italy. Criteria
24 major ports, a number likely to increase if the parameters of traffic set by the law are met (for three years, traffic volume not lower than 3 million tons per year or 200,000 TEUs); these are non-economic public bodies endowed with juridical personality and administrative, budget and financial autonomy within the limits set by the law Lesser ports, which do not meet the parameters necessary for the constitution of a Port Authority; these are decentralized structures of the central government without decision-making autonomy These are present in the ports of Chioggia, Monfalcone, Porto Torres and Agrigento; such facilities are constituted and financed by the Chambers of Commerce
Ministry of Transport and with budgetary and financial autonomy subjected to restrictions imposed by the law. It is composed of the Chairman (appointed by the Minister of Transport in concert with the Regional Governor), the Port Committee (composed of representatives of the local authorities), the General Secretariat and the Auditor’s Committee. Each Port Authority has the following functions: policy and planning function (through strategic management and landplanning); and also coordination, marketing and control over port operations and activities performed within the port area; maintenance; and landlord (owning the port land and granting terminals through concessions to private operators) with the possibility of directly providing utilities within the port. Therefore, port authorities play a major role in port territory planning; such a role was confirmed by the law decree dated 31 March 1998, no. 112 on the attribution of administrative functions and tasks to the regions and to local bodies. Port planning documents are adopted by the Port Committee, following an agreement with the interested municipalities. The activities of port promotion and development are up to the port authorities. The Port Authority President and the ‘‘Comitato Portuale’’ (Port Committee) are responsible for finding out and programming the infrastructure and superstructure works to improve the port efficiency. In order to do this, they
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prepare and approve a ‘‘Piano Triennale’’ (three-year plan) of port development. The building of infrastructure and the purchasing of superstructure depend on private funds, different financial sources (Interregg Programme, European Programme, Regional Programme, etc.) and Ministerial transfer funds. Capital and routine maintenance are up to both port authorities and maritime authorities. The latter are harbour offices of the Minister. As for the issuing of concessions, a concession may last 30 years at the most, with the exception of large investments in infrastructure charged to the concessionary, for which, with prior authorisation of the appropriate Ministry, port authorities may grant longer concessions on the grounds that it is consistent with the port’s development strategy. As already indicated, according to the principle of separation of tasks, the law does not allow port authorities to directly perform port operations and activities; they can only provide ancillary activities, based for example on supporting intermodal and logistic development. Entrepreneurial activity within the port area cannot be performed by the port authority, only by competitive private enterprises.
5. ENVIRONMENT, STRUCTURE AND STRATEGY OF ITALIAN PORTS The utilisation of the Matching Framework proposed by Baltazar and Brooks (2001) permits the analysis of the performance of a port organisation on the basis of three variables: environment, strategies and structure. Such a scheme is based on the classic paradigm of business economy, which considers the environment, strategies and structure as critical variables for the success of an enterprise, by adopting it to port systems. With reference to the Italian situation (Table 6.3), all the external sectors that, either directly or indirectly, affect the port are considered as environment (industrial sector, economic situation, social and cultural environment, human resources, financial resources, political context, etc.). The variable ‘‘structure,’’ on the other hand, represents the model utilised to implement strategy, which, in turn, consists of policies aimed at facilitating the integrated and coordinated development of Italian ports. The starting point to analyse the variable ‘‘environment’’ is the consideration of all the factors affecting the organisation’s ability to achieve its own objectives, starting from the idea that the environment is characterised by a given degree of uncertainty deriving from the lack of perfect
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Table 6.3.
The Matching Framework Applied to Italian Ports. Configuration 1
Environment
Strategy
Structure
Configuration 2 High uncertainty High complexity and dynamism
Efficiency-oriented Focus on delivery of the basic product and service Mechanistic Centralised decision-making characterised by procedural standardisation
Source: Adapted from Baltazar & Brooks (2001).
information which, in turn, brings about high levels of complexity and dynamism. In terms of a good performance of the organisation, therefore, it is necessary for the structure to be adequate to the level of complexity and dynamism of the environment. In other words, a highly dynamic environment requires a decentralised structure characterised by higher flexibility and lighter bureaucratic procedures. Moreover, vis-a`-vis possible strategies, an organisation may decide to focus its attention either on the production of basic products and services or on innovation and differentiation policies. More generally, we could say that the higher the ‘‘degree of fitness’’ among the variables taken into account, the better the result expected in terms of the economic performance of the port organisation. With regard to the variable environment, and taking into account the evolution of Italian ports in time, it appears that the public authority has historically governed the port sector through a very centralised port policy. The state, under a system of monopoly, controlled the port land, infrastructure, equipment and also the financing of new investments without stimulating any private entrepreneurial development. Only after the 1994 reform, with the accompanying decentralisation of powers and the introduction of port authorities in the main Italian ports, did the important process of privatisation of port services get started. The reform process coincided with the modification of international maritime networks, which brought the Mediterranean area within main international traffic flows linking Asia, Europe and North America (Fig. 6.2), as a result of the growth in the importance of Asia in global trade. The Mediterranean basin is becoming one of the most dynamic European areas, especially for container transshipment, and the Italian ports can
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Fig. 6.2.
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Deviation of Mediterranean Ports from the Main Gibraltar–Suez Shipping Lane. Source: Ridolfi (1999).
acquire importance compared with the past (Valleri & Venezia, 1997). Expanding transshipment ports, such as Gioia Tauro and Taranto, have therefore gained a foothold in the market. Moreover, during the last few years, some Italian ports, taking advantage of the port reform and the privatisation process still in progress, are increasing their volume of traffic, especially due to growing investments by the big international shipping companies (e.g., in Gioia Tauro, Taranto and Cagliari) (Table 6.4). Singapore’s PSA Corp., the world’s second largest terminal operator, gained a strong foothold in the European port sector by agreeing to take over a 60 percent shareholding in Sinport, the FIAT logistic subsidiary, which holds majority stakes in Genoa Voltri Terminal Europa (VTE), Venice and Civitavecchia. Indeed, in the port of Taranto, a company belonging to Evergreen Marine Corporation of Taipei (Taiwan) today manages a terminal container, with a 60-year concession agreement with the Taranto Port Authority. Moreover, the lead Mediterranean transshipment port, Gioia Tauro, is experiencing positive growth due to both its strategic position within the main trans-Mediterranean routes and the investments of Contship and other companies belonging to the German Euro Eurokai and Eurogate group. On the basis of the developments just described, it appears that the external environment is becoming more complex and dynamic and consequently quite uncertain. The changed environmental scenario stimulated the
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Table 6.4. Port
MARISA A. VALLERI ET AL.
Terminal Operators’ Investments in the Main Italian Ports (2003). Terminal
Gioia Tauro
Medcenter Container Terminal (MCT)
La Spezia Cagliari Taranto Trieste
La Spezia Container Terminal (LSCT) Mediterranean International Transshipment Hub (MITH) Taranto Container Terminal (TCT) Molo VII
Genoa Venice Leghorn Ravenna Civitavecchia
Voltri Terminal Europa (VTE) Venice Container Terminal (Vecon) Terminal Darsena Toscana Terminal Container Ravenna (TCR) Roma Terminal Container (RTC)
Operator Contship Eurogate (1996–) Maersk (10%) Contship Eurogate (1996–) P&O (2001–) Evergreen (2001–) ECT (1997–2001)Koper (2001–) PSA (1997–) PSA (1998–) Eurogate (2001–) Eurogate (2001–) PSA/Evergreen (1998–)
revision of port regulation that, as stated above, brought about the 1994 reform (Musso, 2001). Although there was a decentralisation of power in major ports, with a consequent higher management autonomy compared with the past, the reform still left some structural bonds unchanged. In fact, Italian ports are still penalised by a very bureaucratic administrative structure, provided with little operational flexibility vis-a`-vis planning procedures and implementation modes of port infrastructures and political interferences, particularly in the process of defining the bodies of port authorities and composition of port committees. This restricted managerial autonomy often limits the port strategic development, leading ports to focus on the delivery of basic products and services and on efficiency-oriented strategies, rather than letting them commit to supplying added-value services, such as logistics activities and IT supports. At the same time, financial restrictions still remain. The port authority’s financial statement, completely separate from that of the municipality and prepared in accordance with civil accounting principles, shows revenues deriving from port dues, concessions of port areas and income from the provision of the same port services. However, trends in traffic have an almost imperceptible effect on the financial statement of port authorities. This is because a large part of harbour dues charged by the Italian port authorities to port users is directly channeled into state coffers, while port authorities retain only around 15 percent. This percentage is quite low, particularly when compared with the percentage of other ports abroad
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(Moglia & Sanguineri, 2000). Therefore, the idea to devolve a great portion of port revenue to the port governing body could fill one of the principal limits of the reform law and offer more competitiveness to Italian ports (Sciutto, 2002). All in all, the need arises to restructure the port legal setting, to revitalise strategy and port structure, as well as the role and functions of port authorities (De Monie, 2004), with an institutional reform that can allow authorities to increase their range of action and limit the intervention of the central government and of the political interference. Using the Matching Framework, the Italian port system is still far from a complete alignment among the organisational external environment, strategy and structure. Even if the environment is becoming extremely complex and dynamic for Italian and other Mediterranean ports due to their strategic position in new international trade networks, there is a strong need to restructure the port legal setting and revitalise port strategy and structure. If port authorities intend to move towards innovation-oriented strategies, based on the development of adequate industrial nodes, hinterland connections, logistic activities and modern technologies, more organic structures and decentralised decision-making processes must be urgently implemented.
5. CONCLUSIONS Up to the beginning of the 1990s, the Italian port sector was characterised by centralised policy and organisation of the port maritime activities. As a consequence, the entrepreneurial activities carried out in ports did not feel the need for productivity improvements and a focus on competitiveness. Following a revolution in technology and the opening of markets, and in order to increase port productivity and competitiveness, it is now paramount to focus attention on the models of governance that may influence the port’s life cycle, keeping in the market those ports that appear as more ‘‘desirable’’ in terms of time and quality of services. In such a general view, the Italian ports were subjected to rigid regulation that hampered the adaptation of the organisation to the new, pressing needs of the world market, resulting in a management that did not help Italian port development. This contributed to the beginning of a radical process of reform in the port sector, which involved the organisation of major ports, with the introduction of some autonomous port authorities, which now support the already existing maritime authorities.
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Nonetheless, the existing administrative and managerial assets do not seem to be completely adequate to sustain a competitive port development; as a matter of fact, the application of the Matching Framework detected some discrepancies among the variables considered. The present port environment is more dynamic, due to the new centrality of the Mediterranean area with respect to the international maritime routes, thanks to new foreign investments. However, the Italian ports are still anchored to bureaucratic structures and slow decision-making procedures. Even if, on the one hand, the port reform law promoted terminal privatisation, on the other, it failed the objective of giving Italian ports full decision-making and financial autonomy that is a fundamental element to bring ports towards competitive development. Such inadequacy also resides in the fact that there is still no Italian ‘‘port range’’: as a consequence, the port environment suffers from the competition among small ports, which wage war among themselves rather than specialising. A greater attention to the processes of port governance is, therefore, necessary just as it is necessary for port authorities to implement infrastructure or service investments, according to the strategic aims that each port deems more important, pending a general reorganisation of both local development and port systems.
REFERENCES Baltazar, R., & Brooks, M. R. (2001). The governance of port devolution: A tale of two countries. World Conference on Transport Research, Seoul, Korea, July. Brooks, M. R., Button, K., & Nijkamp, P. (Eds) (2002). Classics in transport analysis: Maritime transport. Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar. Cullinane, K. P. B., & Song, D.-W. (2002). Port privatization: Principles and practice. Transport Reviews, 22(1), 55–75. De Monie, G. (2004). Mission and role of port authorities after ‘privatisation’. ITTMA-PPPP Seminar, Antwerp, November. Federtrasporto. (2004). Statistiche – trasporto marittimo. http://www.federtrasporto.it Italian port reform law no. 84 of 28 January (1994). Riordino della legislazione in materia portuale. Moglia, F., & Sanguineri, M. (2000). The new models of port governance. Proceedings of the International Association of Maritime Economists. Conference, Naples. Musso, E. (2001). Regulation and deregulation nei porti: che cosa, come e quando regolamentare. Giornate di studi superiori sulla organizzazione dei trasporti nell’ integrazione economica europea. Trieste: ISTIEE. Ridolfi, G. (1999). Containerisation in the Mediterranean: Between global ocean routeways and feeder services. GeoJournal, 48, 29–34.
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Sciutto, G. (Ed.) (2002). I porti italiani e la sfida di mercati. Genoa: Sciro Edizioni. Valleri, M. A., & Van de Voorde, E. (1992). Do Mediterranean ports have a future? Journal of Regional Policy, 2, 411–430. Valleri, M., & Venezia, E. (1997). Regional policy and maritime transport: The Italian case. Proceedings of the 8th Congress of International Maritime Association of the Mediterranean (IMAM), Istanbul, Turkey.
1. INTRODUCTION The recent changes in maritime economics and, in particular, in port economics, modified the role of ports which are now considered fundamental links in the global logistic chain, able to produce innovative transport services in a more or less competitive way. These changes also focused attention on the institutional and managerial assets, with the aim of detecting governance structures that enable ports to be more competitive and to acquire the right amount of flexibility to adapt to market changes, in order to seize the arising opportunities (Brooks, Button, & Nijkamp, 2002). Devolution, Port Governance and Port Performance Research in Transportation Economics, Volume 17, 139–153 Copyright r 2007 by Elsevier Ltd. All rights of reproduction in any form reserved ISSN: 0739-8859/doi:10.1016/S0739-8859(06)17006-7
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In particular, this chapter aims at analysing the evolution of laws and of the management of assets at Italian ports. Such analysis will focus on the recent legislative and managerial developments in the Italian port policy, using the Matching Framework (Baltazar & Brooks, 2001) as a reference scheme. This permits us to relate the three fundamental variables (environment, strategy and structure) of an organisation as a port, with the aim of drawing conclusions about the current performance of the devolution efforts in the Italian port sector.
2. THE ITALIAN PORT SYSTEM Italy’s irregular 8,000 km coastline favoured the development of a number of ports. Nonetheless, the prevalence of mountains and hills longitudinally crossing the peninsula has always constituted an obstacle to the implementation of easy connections between ports and their hinterland. There are over 300 ports in Italy, considering also exclusively tourist and fishery ports. Maritime ports, which originate an activity of goods and/or passenger traffic, no matter how little, and are therefore functional to the national transport system, number about 100 (see Fig. 6.1). Italian Law no. 84/94 (Italian port reform law no. 84 of 28 January, 1994) divided ports into categories and classes. Category I includes ports for the military defence and security of the Nation; category II includes commercial ports, which, in turn, are divided into three classes: class I (ports of international economic relevance), class II (ports of national economic relevance) and class III (ports of regional and interregional economic relevance). The same law determined the prominence of some ports belonging to one of the first two classes of category II, there constituting port authorities. Initially, there were 18 ports (Ancona, Bari, Brindisi, Cagliari, Catania, Civitavecchia, Genoa, La Spezia, Leghorn, Marina di Carrara, Messina, Naples, Palermo, Ravenna, Savona, Taranto, Trieste and Venice) but the number increased to 24 (including also Piombino, Gioia Tauro, Salerno, Olbia – Golfo Aranci, Augusta and Trapani), following further Decrees of the President of the Republic, as paragraph 8 of art. 6 of the above-mentioned law determines that other port authorities could be constituted if an increase in the volume of the traffic of goods not lower than 3 million tons per year, or 200,000 TEUs, was recorded over three years. Table 6.1 shows the recent evolution of goods and container transport in the main Italian ports. In particular, in the four-year period under consideration, a total growth in the sector of goods was recorded, amounting to
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Trieste Venice Ravenna Genoa Savona Marina di Carrara La Spezia Leghorn
Ancona
Piombino
Civitavecchia Bari Brindisi
Olbia
Naples Salerno Taranto
Gioia Tauro Cagliari Palermo Trapani Catania
Messina
Augusta
Fig. 6.1.
The Italian Port Authorities.
slightly less than 6 percent, due to the fact that most ports under evaluation showed a positive trend. It is the container sector, however, that shows the most significant growth (amounting to 26 percent between 2000 and 2003), with the dominant position of the terminals in Gioia Tauro, which in 2003 moved about 3.1 million TEUs, Genoa 1.6 million TEUs, and La Spezia 1.0 million TEUs, followed by Taranto 0.7 million TEUs. It is evident that the positive trend is mainly due to the development of predominantly transshipment ports (Gioia Tauro, Taranto and Cagliari).
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Table 6.1.
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Goods and Container Transport in the Major Italian Ports (2000–2003).
Ports
Ancona Augusta Bari Brindisi Cagliari–Sarroch Catania Civitavecchia Genoa Gioia Tauro La Spezia Leghorn Marina di Carrara Messina-Milazzo Naples Olbia–G.Aranci Palermo Piombino Ravenna Salerno Savona-Vado Taranto Trieste Venice Total
Goods (million tons)
Container (‘000 TEUs)
2000
2001
2002
2003
2000
2001
2002
2003
11.15 31.30 3.45 8.05 30.32 2.64 9.85 50.80 30.82 16.52 24.58 3.38 10.62 14.78 5.76 5.22 10.38 22.68 3.83 13.20 33.88 47.61 28.18
13.72 31.31 3.50 8.92 29.04 2.65 8.84 50.18 29.61 15.85 24.66 3.15 13.95 16.72 5.20 5.27 9.00 23.81 4.45 13.27 34.53 49.14 28.81
12.51 31.59 3.61 8.74 31.60 2.74 9.35 51.75 25.59 18.20 25.33 3.27 15.73 18.63 5.70 4.91 8.171 23.93 4.97 13.15 34.67 47.17 29.55
9.57 29.28 3.93 10.17 34.07 4.13 8.43 53.71 25.45 19.79 25.73 3.06 17.56 19.41 5.92 5.41 8.67 24.91 7.08 13.41 37.51 46.00 30.13
84 – 1 7 22 13 13 1,501 2,653 910 501 11 – 397 – 17 – 181 276 37 3 17 206
90 – 2 6 35 11 16 1,527 2,488 975 502 9 – 431 – 15 – 158 321 51 198 19 201
94 – 12 1 74 13 21 1,531 3,009 975 520 10 – 444 – 11 – 161 375 55 472 17 185
76 – 24 2 314 14 25 1,606 3,149 1,007 541 9 – 433 – 15 – 160 417 54 658 13 120
419.00
425.58
430.861
443.33
7,051
7,280
8,226
8,908
Source: Federtrasporto. (2004). Statistiche – Trasporto marittimo.
All in all, the national network of goods flow indicates three large geographic areas having different functions and vocations: the Northeast one (Northern Adriatic), the Northwest (Northern Thyrrenian) and South. Northeastern ports are distant from the main ship routes between the Suez Canal and the Straits of Gibraltar. The prevailing traffic in these ports, therefore, is trans-Adriatic and intra-Mediterranean. On the other hand, Northwestern ports, although also distant from the main routes of crossing of the Mediterranean basin enjoy the attraction effect of the tight port network formed by Marseille, Barcelona and Valencia. The weak point here seems to be the link with other transport modes, complementary to the maritime mode. In fact, road mobility is hampered by the location of the
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port inside towns or in their vicinity, whereas railway mobility is limited by the nearness of the Alps or the Appennines. Southern ports, however, have an optimal location compared with the Gibraltar–Suez direction. Nonetheless, they are heavily affected by the lack of internal links with the national and European infrastructure network. To increase its share in the European port industry, the Italian port system therefore needs to overcome limitations concerning ports such as infrastructure (in relation to the services offered, the equipped areas, etc.) and links with the hinterland.
3. THE EVOLUTION OF THE ITALIAN PORT LAWS Italian laws have historically considered port services and activities as public goods. The 1942 code of navigation achieved the maximum functionality towards public interest in the activities in this sector and confirmed a high level of intrusion of administrative power on those interested in maritime navigation and related activities. On the one hand, it emphasised ports as belonging to the maritime state and, on the other, the availability of port services to the public. The character of state property is related to both the function of port areas and to the ownership of the port by the Public Administration, with the consequent imposition of bonds and organisational models also on the private actors operating in the port. In time, the overlapping of competences of the various local and central administrations interested in port activities caused government to look for autonomous forms of management that allowed for a better exploitation and development of the port. With this aim, it was necessary to speed up the adoption of provisions, and this only seemed possible through the centralisation of many functions and activities into a single, local and autonomous body – the State. The need for such a new organisation was first recognised in 1903 with the creation of the Consortium of the Port of Genoa (Law 12 February 1903, no. 50). It was an autonomous consortium whose aim was, through the special funds it had been endowed with, to see to the implementation of public works, management and the coordination of port services. The constitution of the Consortium of Genoa, just like the successive constitutions of other port organisations in some of the major ports, met the need to transfer management tasks, implementation and maintenance of port works, rather than the real will to decentralise functions and powers.
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When the Fascists were in power, port organisations were dissolved, in line with the centralising principle, typical of the regime. Only after World War I were these organisations resumed, having wider functions ranging from administration (planning of port works, concession of maritime state property, discipline of port works, authority over tariffs) to entrepreneurship, aimed at managing port operations and service supply. Where such organisations were not present, the Minister of Merchant Marine entrusted various actors with the management of ports, such as volunteer consortia among local entities, special branches of the Chambers of Commerce, businesses and mixed consortia, and private businesses. The remaining ports were directly administered by the state through local maritime authorities. The level of autonomy was different in different ports. If the ports administered by maritime authorities were directly controlled by the state, those managed by port consortia could enjoy a certain level of financial autonomy. Important support for the process of liberalisation of the port sector (Cullinane & Song, 2002) came from the substantial changes that occurred in the international maritime economy, in particular, the development of container traffic and the growth of intermodal transport. Compared with such revolutions, the organisational assets of Italian ports appeared more and more inadequate. The demand for port services was changing, requiring better and better performance. The need to overcome the prevailing institutional model’s difficulty in adapting to new demands brought about an intense and prolonged debate about the possible lines of reform of port regulation. In particular, during the 1980s, many reorganisation proposals for the port sector were formulated. Among these, a document by Confindustria dated 1984 must be underlined; it featured the separation of the activity of control carried out by the port organisation from the organisation of port services, which had to be entrusted to business-like managers. The document also suggested creating public–private mixed societies for the activities of planning, execution and management of port areas in order to promote an increase in competitiveness for Mediterranean ports (Valleri & Van de Voorde, 1992). Summarising, Italian ports before 1994 were characterised by The bureaucratic presence of the Public Administration; A strong connection between administrative and entrepreneurial activities by port organisations; A regulation of port activities imposing bonds and organisational models also to private operators, in virtue of concessions and/or authorisations;
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The copresence of different models of management in different ports; The monopoly on the supply of manpower in port operations in favour of the workers of port companies (art. 110, last paragraph of the code on navigation).
4. THE PORT REFORM The basic principle of the Framework Law no. 84/1994 on the ‘‘Reorganisation of legislation on ports’’ is to separate the development of port operations and the task of controlling and directing port activities. Actually, the former are carried out by authorised private port enterprises, whereas the latter are provided by port authorities, as constituted in the main Italian ports, which discipline and monitor the carrying out of port operations. Briefly, port authorities replace port organisations, whereas maritime authorities, which are present in every port in accordance with the Italian Navigation Code and other special laws, carry out a policy and safety role as well as those administrative duties that do not come under the port authorities’ competence. Maritime authorities have specifically the following functions: coast guard, search and sea rescue; safety of navigation; maritime police (the regulating of traffic in and out of the port’s waters, berthing and maritime traffic; organisation of ancillary services and relevant tariffs; inquiries and investigations on navigation accidents); naval property and administrative regulation of vessels; and marine environment safety and protection. Where port authorities were not constituted, only local maritime authorities discipline and survey on the carrying out of port functions. Finally, a small number of ports are managed by special port enterprises, which are peripheral structures of the Chambers of Commerce, as expressly indicated by law 84 (Table 6.2). There are four Special Enterprises of the Chambers, two of which (Porto Torres and Agrigento) are exclusively dedicated to activities of promotion, whereas the other two (Monfalcone and Chioggia) carry out production services, drawing income from managing stores and mechanical structures under convention, as well as from the rents of port buildings and services. The Port Authority is a public body endowed with legal status, with administrative autonomy that is subjected to restrictions imposed by the
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Table 6.2. Type Port authorities
Maritime authorities
Special port enterprises
Port Structure in Italy. Criteria
24 major ports, a number likely to increase if the parameters of traffic set by the law are met (for three years, traffic volume not lower than 3 million tons per year or 200,000 TEUs); these are non-economic public bodies endowed with juridical personality and administrative, budget and financial autonomy within the limits set by the law Lesser ports, which do not meet the parameters necessary for the constitution of a Port Authority; these are decentralized structures of the central government without decision-making autonomy These are present in the ports of Chioggia, Monfalcone, Porto Torres and Agrigento; such facilities are constituted and financed by the Chambers of Commerce
Ministry of Transport and with budgetary and financial autonomy subjected to restrictions imposed by the law. It is composed of the Chairman (appointed by the Minister of Transport in concert with the Regional Governor), the Port Committee (composed of representatives of the local authorities), the General Secretariat and the Auditor’s Committee. Each Port Authority has the following functions: policy and planning function (through strategic management and landplanning); and also coordination, marketing and control over port operations and activities performed within the port area; maintenance; and landlord (owning the port land and granting terminals through concessions to private operators) with the possibility of directly providing utilities within the port. Therefore, port authorities play a major role in port territory planning; such a role was confirmed by the law decree dated 31 March 1998, no. 112 on the attribution of administrative functions and tasks to the regions and to local bodies. Port planning documents are adopted by the Port Committee, following an agreement with the interested municipalities. The activities of port promotion and development are up to the port authorities. The Port Authority President and the ‘‘Comitato Portuale’’ (Port Committee) are responsible for finding out and programming the infrastructure and superstructure works to improve the port efficiency. In order to do this, they
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prepare and approve a ‘‘Piano Triennale’’ (three-year plan) of port development. The building of infrastructure and the purchasing of superstructure depend on private funds, different financial sources (Interregg Programme, European Programme, Regional Programme, etc.) and Ministerial transfer funds. Capital and routine maintenance are up to both port authorities and maritime authorities. The latter are harbour offices of the Minister. As for the issuing of concessions, a concession may last 30 years at the most, with the exception of large investments in infrastructure charged to the concessionary, for which, with prior authorisation of the appropriate Ministry, port authorities may grant longer concessions on the grounds that it is consistent with the port’s development strategy. As already indicated, according to the principle of separation of tasks, the law does not allow port authorities to directly perform port operations and activities; they can only provide ancillary activities, based for example on supporting intermodal and logistic development. Entrepreneurial activity within the port area cannot be performed by the port authority, only by competitive private enterprises.
5. ENVIRONMENT, STRUCTURE AND STRATEGY OF ITALIAN PORTS The utilisation of the Matching Framework proposed by Baltazar and Brooks (2001) permits the analysis of the performance of a port organisation on the basis of three variables: environment, strategies and structure. Such a scheme is based on the classic paradigm of business economy, which considers the environment, strategies and structure as critical variables for the success of an enterprise, by adopting it to port systems. With reference to the Italian situation (Table 6.3), all the external sectors that, either directly or indirectly, affect the port are considered as environment (industrial sector, economic situation, social and cultural environment, human resources, financial resources, political context, etc.). The variable ‘‘structure,’’ on the other hand, represents the model utilised to implement strategy, which, in turn, consists of policies aimed at facilitating the integrated and coordinated development of Italian ports. The starting point to analyse the variable ‘‘environment’’ is the consideration of all the factors affecting the organisation’s ability to achieve its own objectives, starting from the idea that the environment is characterised by a given degree of uncertainty deriving from the lack of perfect
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Table 6.3.
The Matching Framework Applied to Italian Ports. Configuration 1
Environment
Strategy
Structure
Configuration 2 High uncertainty High complexity and dynamism
Efficiency-oriented Focus on delivery of the basic product and service Mechanistic Centralised decision-making characterised by procedural standardisation
Source: Adapted from Baltazar & Brooks (2001).
information which, in turn, brings about high levels of complexity and dynamism. In terms of a good performance of the organisation, therefore, it is necessary for the structure to be adequate to the level of complexity and dynamism of the environment. In other words, a highly dynamic environment requires a decentralised structure characterised by higher flexibility and lighter bureaucratic procedures. Moreover, vis-a`-vis possible strategies, an organisation may decide to focus its attention either on the production of basic products and services or on innovation and differentiation policies. More generally, we could say that the higher the ‘‘degree of fitness’’ among the variables taken into account, the better the result expected in terms of the economic performance of the port organisation. With regard to the variable environment, and taking into account the evolution of Italian ports in time, it appears that the public authority has historically governed the port sector through a very centralised port policy. The state, under a system of monopoly, controlled the port land, infrastructure, equipment and also the financing of new investments without stimulating any private entrepreneurial development. Only after the 1994 reform, with the accompanying decentralisation of powers and the introduction of port authorities in the main Italian ports, did the important process of privatisation of port services get started. The reform process coincided with the modification of international maritime networks, which brought the Mediterranean area within main international traffic flows linking Asia, Europe and North America (Fig. 6.2), as a result of the growth in the importance of Asia in global trade. The Mediterranean basin is becoming one of the most dynamic European areas, especially for container transshipment, and the Italian ports can
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Deviation of Mediterranean Ports from the Main Gibraltar–Suez Shipping Lane. Source: Ridolfi (1999).
acquire importance compared with the past (Valleri & Venezia, 1997). Expanding transshipment ports, such as Gioia Tauro and Taranto, have therefore gained a foothold in the market. Moreover, during the last few years, some Italian ports, taking advantage of the port reform and the privatisation process still in progress, are increasing their volume of traffic, especially due to growing investments by the big international shipping companies (e.g., in Gioia Tauro, Taranto and Cagliari) (Table 6.4). Singapore’s PSA Corp., the world’s second largest terminal operator, gained a strong foothold in the European port sector by agreeing to take over a 60 percent shareholding in Sinport, the FIAT logistic subsidiary, which holds majority stakes in Genoa Voltri Terminal Europa (VTE), Venice and Civitavecchia. Indeed, in the port of Taranto, a company belonging to Evergreen Marine Corporation of Taipei (Taiwan) today manages a terminal container, with a 60-year concession agreement with the Taranto Port Authority. Moreover, the lead Mediterranean transshipment port, Gioia Tauro, is experiencing positive growth due to both its strategic position within the main trans-Mediterranean routes and the investments of Contship and other companies belonging to the German Euro Eurokai and Eurogate group. On the basis of the developments just described, it appears that the external environment is becoming more complex and dynamic and consequently quite uncertain. The changed environmental scenario stimulated the
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Table 6.4. Port
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Terminal Operators’ Investments in the Main Italian Ports (2003). Terminal
Gioia Tauro
Medcenter Container Terminal (MCT)
La Spezia Cagliari Taranto Trieste
La Spezia Container Terminal (LSCT) Mediterranean International Transshipment Hub (MITH) Taranto Container Terminal (TCT) Molo VII
Genoa Venice Leghorn Ravenna Civitavecchia
Voltri Terminal Europa (VTE) Venice Container Terminal (Vecon) Terminal Darsena Toscana Terminal Container Ravenna (TCR) Roma Terminal Container (RTC)
Operator Contship Eurogate (1996–) Maersk (10%) Contship Eurogate (1996–) P&O (2001–) Evergreen (2001–) ECT (1997–2001)Koper (2001–) PSA (1997–) PSA (1998–) Eurogate (2001–) Eurogate (2001–) PSA/Evergreen (1998–)
revision of port regulation that, as stated above, brought about the 1994 reform (Musso, 2001). Although there was a decentralisation of power in major ports, with a consequent higher management autonomy compared with the past, the reform still left some structural bonds unchanged. In fact, Italian ports are still penalised by a very bureaucratic administrative structure, provided with little operational flexibility vis-a`-vis planning procedures and implementation modes of port infrastructures and political interferences, particularly in the process of defining the bodies of port authorities and composition of port committees. This restricted managerial autonomy often limits the port strategic development, leading ports to focus on the delivery of basic products and services and on efficiency-oriented strategies, rather than letting them commit to supplying added-value services, such as logistics activities and IT supports. At the same time, financial restrictions still remain. The port authority’s financial statement, completely separate from that of the municipality and prepared in accordance with civil accounting principles, shows revenues deriving from port dues, concessions of port areas and income from the provision of the same port services. However, trends in traffic have an almost imperceptible effect on the financial statement of port authorities. This is because a large part of harbour dues charged by the Italian port authorities to port users is directly channeled into state coffers, while port authorities retain only around 15 percent. This percentage is quite low, particularly when compared with the percentage of other ports abroad
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(Moglia & Sanguineri, 2000). Therefore, the idea to devolve a great portion of port revenue to the port governing body could fill one of the principal limits of the reform law and offer more competitiveness to Italian ports (Sciutto, 2002). All in all, the need arises to restructure the port legal setting, to revitalise strategy and port structure, as well as the role and functions of port authorities (De Monie, 2004), with an institutional reform that can allow authorities to increase their range of action and limit the intervention of the central government and of the political interference. Using the Matching Framework, the Italian port system is still far from a complete alignment among the organisational external environment, strategy and structure. Even if the environment is becoming extremely complex and dynamic for Italian and other Mediterranean ports due to their strategic position in new international trade networks, there is a strong need to restructure the port legal setting and revitalise port strategy and structure. If port authorities intend to move towards innovation-oriented strategies, based on the development of adequate industrial nodes, hinterland connections, logistic activities and modern technologies, more organic structures and decentralised decision-making processes must be urgently implemented.
5. CONCLUSIONS Up to the beginning of the 1990s, the Italian port sector was characterised by centralised policy and organisation of the port maritime activities. As a consequence, the entrepreneurial activities carried out in ports did not feel the need for productivity improvements and a focus on competitiveness. Following a revolution in technology and the opening of markets, and in order to increase port productivity and competitiveness, it is now paramount to focus attention on the models of governance that may influence the port’s life cycle, keeping in the market those ports that appear as more ‘‘desirable’’ in terms of time and quality of services. In such a general view, the Italian ports were subjected to rigid regulation that hampered the adaptation of the organisation to the new, pressing needs of the world market, resulting in a management that did not help Italian port development. This contributed to the beginning of a radical process of reform in the port sector, which involved the organisation of major ports, with the introduction of some autonomous port authorities, which now support the already existing maritime authorities.
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Nonetheless, the existing administrative and managerial assets do not seem to be completely adequate to sustain a competitive port development; as a matter of fact, the application of the Matching Framework detected some discrepancies among the variables considered. The present port environment is more dynamic, due to the new centrality of the Mediterranean area with respect to the international maritime routes, thanks to new foreign investments. However, the Italian ports are still anchored to bureaucratic structures and slow decision-making procedures. Even if, on the one hand, the port reform law promoted terminal privatisation, on the other, it failed the objective of giving Italian ports full decision-making and financial autonomy that is a fundamental element to bring ports towards competitive development. Such inadequacy also resides in the fact that there is still no Italian ‘‘port range’’: as a consequence, the port environment suffers from the competition among small ports, which wage war among themselves rather than specialising. A greater attention to the processes of port governance is, therefore, necessary just as it is necessary for port authorities to implement infrastructure or service investments, according to the strategic aims that each port deems more important, pending a general reorganisation of both local development and port systems.
REFERENCES Baltazar, R., & Brooks, M. R. (2001). The governance of port devolution: A tale of two countries. World Conference on Transport Research, Seoul, Korea, July. Brooks, M. R., Button, K., & Nijkamp, P. (Eds) (2002). Classics in transport analysis: Maritime transport. Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar. Cullinane, K. P. B., & Song, D.-W. (2002). Port privatization: Principles and practice. Transport Reviews, 22(1), 55–75. De Monie, G. (2004). Mission and role of port authorities after ‘privatisation’. ITTMA-PPPP Seminar, Antwerp, November. Federtrasporto. (2004). Statistiche – trasporto marittimo. http://www.federtrasporto.it Italian port reform law no. 84 of 28 January (1994). Riordino della legislazione in materia portuale. Moglia, F., & Sanguineri, M. (2000). The new models of port governance. Proceedings of the International Association of Maritime Economists. Conference, Naples. Musso, E. (2001). Regulation and deregulation nei porti: che cosa, come e quando regolamentare. Giornate di studi superiori sulla organizzazione dei trasporti nell’ integrazione economica europea. Trieste: ISTIEE. Ridolfi, G. (1999). Containerisation in the Mediterranean: Between global ocean routeways and feeder services. GeoJournal, 48, 29–34.
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Sciutto, G. (Ed.) (2002). I porti italiani e la sfida di mercati. Genoa: Sciro Edizioni. Valleri, M. A., & Van de Voorde, E. (1992). Do Mediterranean ports have a future? Journal of Regional Policy, 2, 411–430. Valleri, M., & Venezia, E. (1997). Regional policy and maritime transport: The Italian case. Proceedings of the 8th Congress of International Maritime Association of the Mediterranean (IMAM), Istanbul, Turkey.