A few European ports panic they will lose container traffic to larger rivals who will have American customs agents consistently stationed at their terminals as part of the United States' anti-terror processes.
There is mounting anxiety that ports like Le Havre, Rotterdam and Antwerp, which already dominate Europe's maritime container traffic, will utilize their participation in U.S. Customs' Container Security Initiative (CSI) as a "seal of approval " marketing tool to pull in exporters shipping goods across the Atlantic.
Moreover, these ports are among the 20 mega-hubs handling nearly 70% of U.S.-bound boxes, which are involved in negotiations aimed at stationing American customs officers at their container terminals. Hamburg and Bremerhaven, Germany's largest container ports are also on the CSI list.
The European Sea Ports Association has warned that limiting the CSI to a handful of global ports creates a "serious risk" of distorting trade and competition between terminals. There are fears it will create an unofficial list of approved ports from which cargo will pass quickly through U.S. ports while containers from others ports will face delays.
European ports organizations, including the U.K. Major Ports Group, have called for security measures to be implemented multilaterally through the International Maritime Organization (IMO) and the World Customs Organization. The European Commission, meanwhile, is reportedly unhappy with the bilateral agreements between ports in individual EU member states and the U.S. and wants to negotiate an EU-wide arrangement.
