Menu

Ireland's sailing, boating & maritime magazine

Displaying items by tag: Stormont Executive

27th January 2011

Belfast Harbour Trade Improves

Trade through Belfast Harbour is on the rise after a three-year drop, the The Corkman reports.
Cargo through the port rose by 5% in the last year to 16.5 million tonnes, following a 10% fall since 2007 due to the global economic crisis.
While passenger numbers have fallen slightly, 35 cruise ships carring 62,000 visitors docked in the last 12 months. Meanwhile, bulk cargo trade was up by 12%, and grain and animal feed trade broke the 2 million tonnes.
Salt shipments were also up my more than 200% due to the severe winter freeze.
The numbers will be good news to the Stormont Executive, which is expected to introduced a new levy on harbour trade to offset spending cuts.

Trade through Belfast Harbour is on the rise after a three-year drop, The Corkman reports.

Cargo through the port rose by 5% in the last year to 16.5 million tonnes, following a 10% fall since 2007 resulting from the global economic crisis.

While passenger numbers have fallen slightly, 35 cruise ships carring 62,000 visitors docked in the last 12 months. Meanwhile, bulk cargo trade was up by 12%, and grain and animal feed trade broke 2 million tonnes.

Salt shipments were also up my more than 200% due to the severe winter freeze.

The numbers will be good news to the Stormont Executive, which is expected to introduced a new levy on harbour trade to offset spending cuts.

Published in Belfast Lough

William M Nixon has been writing about sailing in Ireland and internationally for many years, with his work appearing in leading sailing publications on both sides of the Atlantic. He has been a regular sailing columnist for four decades with national newspapers in Dublin, and has had several sailing books published in Ireland, the UK, and the US. An active sailor, he has owned a number of boats ranging from a Mirror dinghy to a Contessa 35 cruiser-racer, and has been directly involved in building and campaigning two offshore racers. His cruising experience ranges from Iceland to Spain as well as the Caribbean and the Mediterranean, and he has raced three times in both the Fastnet and Round Ireland Races, in addition to sailing on two round Ireland records. A member for ten years of the Council of the Irish Yachting Association (now the Irish Sailing Association), he has been writing for, and at times editing, Ireland's national sailing magazine since its earliest version more than forty years ago