Port operator PSA International is not optimistic about a swift recovery in the global market after reporting a double-digit drop in group revenue and decreased container throughput volumes for its terminals.

"2009 will be remembered as one of the world's most difficult years with the near meltdown of the financial markets ... Like everyone else, PSA was adversely affected," says group chairman Fock Siew Wah.

The group saw its first-ever decline in containers handled across its 28 ports worldwide. It registered a 9.9% drop in throughput in 2009 to 56.9 million TEUs. PSA's flagship terminal in Singapore recorded a 13.1% fall in container throughput for 2009, handling 25.1 million TEUs. However, it maintained its position as the world's busiest container port for the fifth consecutive year. Terminals outside Singapore had a total throughput of 31.8 million TEUs, 7.1% lower than in 2008. The slide was softened by markets like China which largely shrugged off the impact of the global crisis and by the contribution from new port start-ups in India and Vietnam.

"The last two months of 2009 and the first two months of 2010 showed tentative signs of recovery but the road ahead will be bumpy and uncertain," warns Eddie Teh, group CEO of PSA International.

Teh fears that "a macro-economic storm will be inevitable to clear the excess global production capacity that was created".

PSA's 2009 group revenue dropped 12.7% from the previous year's SGD4.392 billion (USD3.187 billion) to SGD3.835 billion (USD2.782 billion), while net profit suffered a relatively smaller decline of 6.1% for the same period from SGD1.039 billion (USD754 million) to SGD976 million (USD708 million) due to cost-cutting measures and control of capital expenditure.

PSA International is a leading global port group, participating in 28 port projects in 16 countries in Asia, Europe and the Americas. It has a global capacity of 111 million TEUs over 66km of quay length.