LIVORNO. Two requests, one goal: safeguard container traffic in the port. The first to the Northern Tyrrhenian Sea Port System Authority: putting this desire on paper in the three-year operational plan. The other to the private company, the Grimaldi group, which has been in charge of Terminal Darsena Toscana for a few months: «Explain to us if you want to transfer all Livorno Ro-Ro traffic to TdT».
The mutation of the area once under concession to the Port Investment Group of Genoa worries the presidents of Asamar Francesca Scali, Cna Fita Livorno Massimo Angioli, Confetra Toscana Mario Bartoli, Confindustria Toscana centro e costa Piero Neri, Spedimar Giovanni Tognotti and the manager of the vast area coast of Lega Coop Toscana Ivan Ferrucci. That compact appeals to the public body to do everything to prevent TdT from becoming the main Ro-Ro quay and not, as has happened so far, dedicated to containers, a typology which in 1980 saw Livorno excel in Italy and which currently employs thousands of people for handling and everything else. The fear of the workers is mostly employment-related: if the containers were to decrease, in fact, work would also decrease. And the investments that the Authority has made for Darsena Europa and to widen the access channel allowing the entry of larger ships in the future – again for trade associations – would risk being weakened in doing so.
Of course, there is the public master plan: containers must be moved in Darsena Toscana, so we read, at least as the main type of traffic. But nothing prevents us, given that the area is very large, from dedicating part of it to Ro-Ro, rolling loads, those in which Grimaldi is a leader in the Mediterranean and beyond. And which today are mainly landed in the surrounding areas. «Istat – we read in the document sent by the trade associations to the Port System Authority – quantified in 2021 as 8,367 employees and 853 companies in Livorno attributable to the Ateco transport, handling and warehousing code (Istat classification which categorizes the different economic activities). From the analytical description of the 18 items grouped in that code, it appears that a large part is generated by jobs, tasks and professions in the container supply chain. Even the staff of the public administrations involved in the import, export, regulation and infrastructure processes have been sized to the needs and growth prospects of port activities in that traffic segment. Although the right of the Darsena Toscana concessionaire to combine secondary activities, foreseen by the master plan with the main one of container handling, is beyond question, it appears necessary to mitigate the widespread fear of a mortification of this type of traffic by favoring others. Fears – we read further – that grow when, as has happened in recent days, “secondary” traffic already rooted as “core” in other terminals is transferred to Darsena Toscana. To this end, recalling the numerous reassuring statements that have made public the contents of the checks ordered by the Port System Authority foreseen in the case of changes in the control of the concessionary companies, we believe that the president Luciano Guerrieri must propose to the management committee that in the plan operational three-year period 2024-2027 currently being drafted, the objectives of the strategic planning document and of the previous Pot 2021-2023 are confirmed, which aimed to increase, post pandemic, the number of containers handled each year. In renewing the business plan, the concessionaire company, sharing the objective of increasing container traffic in its terminal, takes into account both the investment commitments and activities aimed at achieving them, and the uniquely incremental nature compared to those already attested in the port of Livorno of the “secondary” traffic that will be handled in Darsena Toscana”. L
© ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
