The following is a partial list of the major shipping ports in the world:
• Shanghai, Qingdao, Tianjin, Dalian, and Guangzhou in China
• Singapore
• Rotterdam (the largest port in Europe), Hamburg, and Antwerp, in Europe
• Portland, New York, New Orleans, and San Francisco in the United States
• Rio De Janeiro, Santos, and Tubarao in Brazil
• Buenos Aires
• Jeddah
• Durban and Cape Town in South Africa
• Colombo
• Fremantle, Brisbane, and Newcastle in Australia
The Chinese Port of Shanghai is the largest port in the world based on cargo throughput. The port currently handles more than 750 million tons of cargo and about 33.0 million containers or twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs). Shanghai International Port Group (SIPG) owns the port and operates 125 berths. The port serves more than two thousand containerships on a monthly basis. Apart from the container terminal, SIPG also owns bulk, breakbulk, specialized Ro/Ro, and cruise terminals. The total warehousing area reaches 293,000 square meters and storage yards a total area of 4,721,000 square meters. The Port of Singapore is the second largest port in the world, with a container throughput of more than thirty million TEUs. The port receives an average of 140,000 vessels on an annual basis and connects six hundred ports globally. The Port of Rotterdam is the largest port in Europe, with an annual throughput of approximately 450 million tons of cargo. Rotterdam is the sixth biggest port in the world annual cargo throughput, and among the world’s top-ten largest container ports in terms of twenty-foot equivalent units (TEU) handled.
The third biggest port in the world is the Port of Tianjin in China. The Port of Tianjin handles about 475 million tons of cargo and 12.3 million TEUs. Other important ports are the Port of Guangzhou (460 million tons of cargo), the Port of Ningbo (453 million tons of cargo) and the ports of Suzhou, Qingdao, and Dalian, all in China. The port of Busan in South Korea is the tenth largest port in the world (298 million tons of cargo).