On 5th December 2022 Tessa Rodewaldt, Managing Director of the German Maritime Platform, and Knut Fleckenstein, former Member of the European Parliament, hosted Isabelle Ryckbost, Secretary General of ESPO in the Hamburg office of von Beust & Coll. Beratungsgesellschaft.
Isabelle Ryckbost provided an overview of the varied roles, challenges, and opportunities for European Seaports – following a year that has at times dramatically changed the operational circumstances for ports and the entire maritime sector.

Some of the key take-aways are:

• European seaports are the green energy hubs of the future and therefore enablers of both the energy and mobility transitions.As a result, they require 
  1. accelerate permitting;
  2. a new approach to spatial planning to account for additional infrastructure needs;
  3. a new skills set.
• Seaports have repeatedly demonstrated their resilience and have established themselves as an essential part of alternative supply chains in times of crisis.
• Co-operation between European seaports as well as with players from the energy sector and political decision-makers is crucial to establishing supply chains for the import of green energy as well as remain globally competitive.
• Given the critical infrastructure they provide, the strategic role of European seaports must be more widely recognised and therefore feature more prominently in the public debate.

So let’s all make this happen both at national, e.g. in the #NationaleHafenstrategie (German Federal Port Strategy), and at European level. This is certainly one of the new year’s resolutions for the German Maritime Platform for 2023.

The Maritime Plattform would like to thank all participants for the lively discussion and engaging questions. See you soon in 2023!  

(c) photos: German Maritime Platform
photo 1: Isabelle Ryckbost (Secretary General of ESPO)
photo 2: Tessa Rodewaldt, Managing Director of the German Maritime Platform (left), Isabelle Ryckbost, Secretary General of ESPO (right)

#ESPO #europeanseaports #criticalinfrastructure #energytransition #mobilitytransition
German Maritime Platform @LinkedIn