Factors determining the importance and market position of leading container terminals in Poland in the years 2007–2016

Abstract

This following article presents the factors that have caused DCT container terminal’s dynamic development since 2007 whereas in the same period the terminals in Gdynia did not significantly broaden their scale, despite an increase of the entire container handling market. The research methods used are the secondary data analysis and expert interviews conducted with the industry representatives. In the first part the authors presented the trends in the development of the global container handling market. Next, the authors showed the structure of the Polish container handling market and comparison of handlings of leading container terminals in Poland in 2007–2016. In the analysed period, significant differences in the dynamics of the handlings volume growth were observed, thus the characteristics of particular terminals were compared in order to find out the reasons of this situation. In the following part, the leading Polish container terminals were characterised: GCT SA and BCT SA in Gdynia, and DCT SA in Gdansk. In the last part of the article, the authors analysed the factors that determined the increase in the number of handlings made by DCT Gdansk. Furthermore, the reasons that prevented the development of terminals located in Gdynia were presented.