Comparação dos modelos de Parcerias Público-Privadas (PPP) nos portos da Europa

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to understand the use of public-private partnerships as a mean of financing port infrastructure and whether if there is evidence of its influence on the ports performance. The work relies essentially on bibliographic research to trace the differences between countries: Portugal, Spain, France, United Kingdom (UK), Netherlands and Germany, however some different documentation was analysed. In 2009, it was found that the amount of cargo handled - it is assumed as an indicator of performance - positions UK first, with 500.9 million tons, followed by the Netherlands with 468.1, Spain with 363.5, France with 315.5, Germany with 262.9 and Portugal with 61.7. The coastline length seems to have some influence on these values, however there was the outlier case of the Netherlands, which had one of the highest performance with a smaller length of coast in the studied group. The studied ports have different government models. The UK follows the private port model with a little state influence, while Germany and the Netherlands follow the landlord port model under municipal control. Portugal, Spain and France adopt the landlord port model, but in this case with great state influence. About the use of PPP, they arise in the port setor in the form of concession or leasing contracts, following the concessive model, where investment in public infrastructure is paid by the user and not by taxpayers. Although each PPP contract to become a particular case, this study concludes that, at the macro level, the contracts between the public and private operators do not have obvious differences that could explain differences in performance. Instead, differences are evident in regard to the mode of ports government, which may have a greater impact on the competitiveness of ports.

Date of Award	Feb 2012
Original language	Portuguese
Awarding Institution	Universidade Católica Portuguesa
Supervisor	Luís Marques (Supervisor), Marta Alves (Co-Supervisor) & Paulo Alves (Co-Supervisor)