Australia: Sydney's Port Botany has experienced its twelfth consecutive month of growth in container trade.
"The green shoots of recovery have turned into solid growth. For the twelfth month in a row, container volumes at Port Botany have hit new records," said New South Wales Treasurer and Minister for Ports and Waterways Mr Roozendaal.
Container trade in September is the highest for the month of September, reaching over 173,600TEU, an increase of 12.6 percent on the same month last year.
Total trade for the financial year to September 30, 2010 was 7.5 million tonnes, which is an increase of 8.4 percent compared to the same period last year.
"This continued growth indicates the strength of the NSW economy and the importance of our trade partnerships with east Asia which – financial year to date – represents 46 percent of full containerised volume into Port Botany, with over 34 percent of that trade with China," he said.
Full containerised exports and imports have fuelled this growth, with full containerised exports reaching 37,500TEUs, up by 8.9 percent in September 2010 compared to the same month last year.
This increase has been has been driven by higher exports in chemicals (up 19.6 percent), paper products (up 7.8 percent) and iron and steel (up 45.4 percent).
The key commodities with the highest growth are textile fabric (up 162.9 percent), chemicals (up 17.8 percent), paper products (up 9.8 percent) and machinery and transport equipment (up 16.6 percent).
