The Port of Barcelona represents 1.7% of Catalonia's entire GDP. This is if only the companies that work in it are counted, but the figure rises to 7% if the entire logistics ecosystem that revolves around it is included. Faced with the current crisis, its president, Mercè Conesa, argues that its obligation is not only to maintain the contribution of this infrastructure to the economy, but that it must be increased.
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This is one of the objectives that outline the Port's IV Strategic Plan, presented this Wednesday in a virtual event held at the headquarters of Foment del Treball, with the participation of Conesa, its general director, José Alberto Carbonell, and the vice president of the employers' association, Joaquim Llansó. The new roadmap aims to consolidate in the long term its position as the main logistics and intelligent hub of the Mediterranean. Economic sustainability is one of its fundamental pieces, but it is not the only one and is accompanied by environmental and social sustainability.
"One cannot grow economically without reducing the carbon footprint or without consolidating quality employment," Conesa emphasizes. "We believe that achieving one part without the other two cannot be considered a success. All three must be achieved simultaneously," she adds.
Before reaching 2040, the infrastructure establishes three short-term milestones in its plan that include these three pillars of sustainability and are in line with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The Port of Barcelona expects to reach 70,000 million euros in foreign trade, have 50% of container and ro-ro docks electrified, and increase the workforce to 40,000 workers. All of this must be met by 2025 to ensure that it becomes the main intelligent logistics hub in Southern Europe within 20 years.
Strategic objectives for the next 20 years
Under the triple premise of sustainability, the Port of Barcelona wants to continue growing, aware of the difficulties it currently faces, such as the scarcity of logistics land and the halt in cruise activity. Despite this, the infrastructure has set twelve strategic objectives to reverse these adversities and strengthen its leadership by 2040.
According to the Port's general director, José Alberto Carbonell, the objectives set by the IV Strategic Plan involve continuing to develop key infrastructures for its operations, such as expanding the Moll Adossat and Prat Nord, and finishing the construction of the Moll Catalunya, where all container activity is to be concentrated, along with the Moll Prat Nord, both in the southern area of the Port, in El Prat de Llobregat.
The Port's general director, José Alberto Carbonell, points out that the IV Strategic Plan contemplates concentrating all container activity in the southern area of the Port, in Moll Adossat and Prat NordThe plan includes increase intermodality, with the development of its railway infrastructure and the increase in trafficrail container transport ---represents 15% of the total---. Intermodality also has to gain weight with the construction of the new rail accesses in the southern area, now that all administrations have finally aligned, and of the new sidings on the Barcelona-Zaragoza line, which will allow the arrival of longer trains, in addition to the commissioning of ashuttleintermodal rail, looking beyond Barcelona and including other territories, such as Vallès and Penedès.
Regarding logistics at the Port of Barcelona, Conesa warns that 97% of the land in the ZAL Port de Barcelona is already occupied. "To continue growing, we need to find and identify new logistics land," she emphasizes. Through public-private collaboration, Conesa is confident in reversing this scarcity, finding new spaces in the municipalities of Barcelona and El Prat. In fact, one of the projects the Port has in mind is the development of a new logistics park of more than 100 hectares at Barcelona Airport.
A green commitment
Beyond gaining competitiveness, the infrastructure aims with the new strategic plan to reduce its environmental impact, with the electrification of the docks, the completion of the Cerdà-Port electrical substation, the commitment to favor calls by ships propelled by Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) and those that are more sustainable, and to generate renewable energy on the Port's rooftops.
The Port of Barcelona also wants to create more than 40 hectares of green areas, linking the Llobregat agricultural park with Montjuïc mountain, an action that will involve an investment of about 24 million euros. Likewise, with the aim of bringing the infrastructure closer to Barcelona residents, it wants to develop a knowledge, innovation, and training hub and promote the blue economy, as the City Council will do in the Port Olímpic, adapt the spaces of Port Vell to the urban fabric, and complete the rehabilitation of the Portal de la Pau building and open a new interpretation center.