Promotion of trade

Commercial trade initiatives in 2019 (I_30)

The three major sustainability objectives for global traffic at Huelva Port are:

1. To maintain and consolidate traditional bulk solids and liquids bulk traffic.
2. To capture new general goods traffic, in containers and ro-ro/ro-pax, tourist cruisers, supplies and luxury yacht activity, etc.
3. To develop the Logistics Activity Area and the Majarabique and Southern Dock terminals.

The objectives take account of a development strategy based on rail connectivity as an added-value differential.

In transversal fashion to all these objectives, some mention should also be made of new activities requiring territorial consolidation and generating import/export maritime traffic. To do this, Customs and Paracustoms Services must be in place with the organisation, sizing and flexibility to match developments in traffic flows and market requirements.

There were 127 commercial actions carried out within this strategic framework in 2019 and the Port Authority attended 13 technical sessions in line with our Commercial Plan.

The Trade Plan functions as an integrated guide within the port’s Business Plan. From this perspective a number of market surveys and analyses are carried out to draw up brand positioning, segment and select possible new markets and customers, and define the specific trade strategies and plans to achieve the objectives described and established in the plans.

The fundamental work outline for commercial action and promotion has been direct and ongoing contact with shipping lines, freight forwarders, intermediaries (shipping agents, stevedores), logistic operators, concessionary holders, investors and other stakeholders, by means of visits, organising local events and meetings of working groups and, above all, the presence at the most important conferences and seminars of the sector, both national and international, from a  customer-oriented approach. Along with commercial actions, development strategies and any other cross-cutting interest defined a priori for the sustainability of the global traffic of the Port of Huelva.

On the other hand, and as regards customs and border inspection services, 4 sessions were held of the Customs and Border Inspection Forum in 2019. The Forum is made up of representatives from terminals,  Agriculture & Fisheries, Animal Health, Exterior and Customs, It is where the matters and incidents of greatest concern for the port operations and the authorities in charge of inspections are discussed in order to search for the best solutions on the basis of coordination and consensus between the institutions and companies that generate the activity and wealth around the port.

HuelvaPort

The Association for the Commercial Promotion of the Port of Huelva -HuelvaPort, founded in July 2016 and with 50 members in 2018, organised a total of 46 trade missions to showcase the Port of Huelva at different points of the country. The port community operators were thus offered the comprehensive range of services to all the port community operators and which make the Port of Huelva and the companies more competitive.

HuelvaPort organised attendance to several events, individually and together with Huelva Port Authority.

The following are such examples: the presentation of the sustainable cold hub at the general meeting of the Spanish Cold Storage, Logistics and Distribution Business Association (Aldefe), the presentation of the Port of Huelva and HuelvaPort at Alcázar de San Juan (Ciudad Real), an important rail hub on the Iberian Peninsula, presence at the  SHIP2 IBERIA event, in Rotterdam (Holland), having a stand at the Metallic Mining Hall in Seville, participation in the VIII Hispano-Moroccan Business Meeting of the Maritime Sector, Transport and Logistics, held in Tangiers (Marruecos), attending the Halieutis Fair in Agadir (Morocco), Logismed in Casablanca and the Andalusian-Moroccan Business Meeting in Rabat, It was also at the I Madrid Logistics Meeting in Coslada and Fruit Attraction in the Spanish capital, where different meetings were held with Canary Island banana exporters and logistics companies related to this sector, such as shipping companies and freight land transport companies. Furthermore, HuelvaPort was involved in organising the event to launch the Sustainable Cold Logistics Huber at the Port of Huelva.

HuelvaPort also attended other different events to represent the port community, both nationally and internationally, including oil & gas, logistics and intermodality, and agri-food events, business seminars, conferences on solid bulk and  cruise industry trade fairs. As regards liquid bulk, HuelvaPort and Huelva Port Authority attended the Expoliva fair in Jaén for the first time.

On the other hand, HuelvaPort ran training schemes in conjunction with Huelva Chamber of Commerce and the Huelva Port Authority as part of the FOCOMAR programme. The training plan consisted of a seminar on the Authorised Economic Operator, a seminar on the Community Customs Code (CCC); Blockchain in the port logistics field; a course on Port Facility Security and a session on Incoterms 2020.  As part of the relations with the port community, HuelvaPort and Huelva Port Authority held four sessions of the Customs and Border Inspection Forum.

Passenger traffic: tourist cruise liners

The Huelva Port Authority and HuelvaPort continue to attend major national and international conferences on cruises in order to attract tourist liners to Huelva Port and generate opportunities of economic growth not only for the port, but also for the city of Huelva and the surrounding province.

Given the great increase in the occupancy of the South Wharf by RO-RO and containerised general cargo commercial traffic discussed at the start of this report, the tourist cruise traffic was moved to the Levante Wharf, the only one available for that purpose, in 2019.

This fact together with the APH project to remodel and upgrade of the Levante Wharf, which envisages creating a marina and different shopping, hospitality and leisure areas at that facility, led to a change of strategy last year in the commercial activity aimed at cruise ships. The aim is to attract small cruise ships and mega-yachts to the Levante Wharf for greater Port-City integration and which means cruise passengers will be able to walk to the centre of our city.

This new approach and the ensuing relevant adjustment did not greatly affect cruise traffic at the Port of Huelva in 2019, which ended the year with a total of 7 cruise stopovers and 1,357 passengers, figures much higher than the initial forecasts. The shipping companies whose cruise ships have stopped over at the Port of Huelva include Sea Cloud Cruises, Saga Cruises, Variety Cruises and Phoenix Reisen.

As regards attending events of the sector, the Port of Huelva attended FITUR in Madrid, Seatrade Cruise Global in Fort Lauderdale (Florida, USA) and Seatrade Europe in Hamburg in 2019. It also attended the conferences that CLIA association runs alongside those events, such as the Clia Executive Partner Conference in London.

Expenditure on commercial promotion of the port (I_31)

This indicator is defined as the total resources allocated to promoting the Port with a view to increasing traffic. It forms part of the Strategic Indicators defined in the Balanced Scorecard.

Commercial expenditure on Huelva Port 2019	312,104.15 €
Operating expenditure on Huelva Port 2019	42,465,737.15 €
Percentage in relation to operating expenditure	0.73%