Future Ports Scenarios for 21st Century Port Strategic Planning

Abstract

Seaports are an integral component of the marine transportation system; one that provides the vital link between producers and consumers, importers and exporters and military logisticians and deployed forces. Ports are often a leading catalyst and engine for regional economic growth and prosperity. The health of the region’s and even the nation’s economy can therefore turn on the care, skill and vision that public port commissioners, managers and planners bring to the strategic planning process. The persistent global financial and economic crisis of the early 21st century, long neglected port infrastructure and waterway maintenance projects, existing and forecasted effects of climate change, legal constraints on port development or operations and shifts in trading and shipping patterns will present port authorities with a growing list of challenges in the coming decades. Those challenges are compounded by a series of recent natural disasters and mounting port and vessel security costs in the wake of resurgent piracy and terrestrial terrorist attacks. For some, these challenges warrant careful reconsideration of the port’s very identity, as reflected in its mission and vision statements. One tool that might prove useful to port authorities in the coming years as they approach those planning efforts is Future Ports Scenarios (FPS). The FPS approach seeks to construct an array of possible “futures” for the port, which when taken together provide port policymakers and strategic planners with a comprehensive and coherent inventory of factors to be considered in decisions regarding their ports’ desired future direction. A FPS exercise can therefore be an invaluable preparatory step for initial or recurrent strategic planning for ports.