OREANDA-NEWS. January 15, 2009. Latvian ports handled a total of 63.64 million tons of cargo in 2008, which is 1.9% more than in 2007, according to data compiled by the Ministry of Transport. Latvian ports' cargo turnover increased significantly at the beginning of 2008, by 26.5%, but the growth gradually slowed down to approximately 2% in the second half of 2008.

Of the large ports, the Riga Port registered the steepest increase in cargo turnover from 2007 – 14% to 29.56 million tons.

The Liepaja Port's cargo turnover increased 3.7% to 4.2 million tons, whereas cargo turnover at the Ventspils Port decreased 8% last year to 28.57 million tons.

According to the Transport Ministry's statistics, bulk cargo made up the largest part of the Latvian ports' cargo turnover last year – 30.26 million tons, a 14.9% increase on 2007.

The Latvian ports handled 18.32 million tons of coal (25.7% increase), while handling of other types of bulk cargo decreased: the volume of chemical cargo handled at the Latvian ports was 4.7 million tons (9.2% decrease), and the volume of wood chips was 1.5 million tons (12.5% fall).

The volume of liquid cargo handled at the Latvian ports decreased 5.7% o 24.2 million tons in 2008. Last year the Latvian ports handled 20.9 million tons of oil products (5.7% decrease) and 1.7 million tons of crude oil (21.4% decrease).

General cargo turnover at the Latvian large ports reached 9.2 million tons last year, which is 12% less than in 2007.
The three ports also handled 3.7 million tons of wood last year (23.8% decrease from 2007), 229,248 units of containerized cargo (3% down), and 533,800 tons of ferrous metals (29.1% decrease).