12 June 2024 (Lloyd's List) - THE Djibouti port authority has voiced strong disapproval regarding the significant decline in its ranking in the latest global port efficiency report released by the World Bank, claiming that the study misrepresents the true quality of the port and its operations.
The port plummeted from 26th in 2022 to 379th position in the 2023 Container Port Performance Index, known as CPPI, published by the World Bank and S&P Global Market Intelligence last week.
Djibouti Ports and Free Zones Authority described it as “a drastic and unjustified decline” in a statement posted on X.
“We express our strong disapproval of this report, which we believe grossly misrepresents the true status of our facilities and the quality of services we provide.”
The port authority said the ranking decline may be attributed to discrepancies in data collection or a misunderstanding of the port’s current operational context.
The DPFZA also clarified that the port’s efficiency has not decreased but has improved, as evidenced by a 31.75% increase in vessel calls from 422 vessels with an average of 1,765 movements per vessel in 2022 to 556 vessels with 2,124 movements per vessel in 2023.
Moreover, the port authority said it was “perplexing” that the port was not represented or ranked in the sub-Saharan Africa region in the report but moved to the west, central, and south Asia region.
Located on the northeast coast of the Horn of Africa, the port of Djibouti faces Yemen across the Bab el Mandeb Strait, serving as a crucial gateway to the Red Sea.
DPFZA said it was engaged with the World Bank to address the issue and review the methodology and data used in the assessment.
The CCPI is a comparable assessment of performance based on vessel time in port, jointly published by the World Bank and S&P Global Ratings.
This year’s assessment includes a total of 405 ports, which were selected based on the requirement of having a minimum of 24 valid port calls.
The report calculated the efficiency index by analysing the average port hours per port call across different vessel groups.
The World Bank told Lloyd’s List that the report’s authors are reviewing the data and may provide an explanation at a later time.
