Memo: Importance of ports for economic recovery and jobs

Sea ports play an important role facilitating the European Union's external trade (90% of the total, in terms of weight) and internal market exchanges (40% of the total). They provide a service to many other industrial sectors and are nodal points of inter-modal logistic chains of key importance for the sustainable growth of transport in Europe.

European ports are also important job generators. At EU level, the extent of the employment effects of port activity (direct, indirect, induced and related activities) represents million of jobs1 and a significant contribution to economic growth (GDP).

European Commission: Speech/12/352: Siim Kallas: Steering a course for the future: Europe's ports in the 21st century http://europa.eu/rapid/pressReleasesAction.do?reference=SPEECH/12/352&format=HTML&aged=0&language=EN&guiLanguage=en

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