Transport Policy 38 (2015) 4051

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Transport Policy
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/tranpol

Container port competitiveness and connectivity: The Canary Islands

main ports case
Beatriz Tovar a,n, Rubn Hernndez b, Hctor Rodrguez-Dniz c
a
Infrastructure and Transport Research Group (EIT), Department of Applied Economics, University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, FCEE D.2.20, 35017 Las
Palmas de Gran Canaria, Spain
b
Department of Logistics, Innovation Center, Industrial Engineering Department, Mahidol University, 25/25 Phuttamonthon 4 Road, Salaya, NakhonPathom
73170, Thailand
c
Statistics Division, Department of Computer and Information Science, Linkping University, 581 83 Linkping, Sweden

art ic l e i nf o

a b s t r a c t

Article history:
Received 10 April 2014
Received in revised form
27 October 2014
Accepted 2 November 2014
Available online 18 December 2014

The Canary Islands' economy is extremely dependent on sea transport. Since accessibility and connectivity are major determinants of international transport costs, the analysis of their main ports' connectivity is crucial for keeping costs under control. Since different port authorities manage the major
ports of the Canary Islands, they could be tempted to compete for transshipment cargoes, instead of
working together to facilitate supply chain integration that would increase their competitive standing.
The aim of the paper is twofold. First, the infrastructure and superstructure endowment of the main
Canarian ports and their accessibility, by evaluating site and situation factors, is documented. Secondly,
the connectivity of the main Canarian ports is assessed by means of graph theory. This provides important measures that dene a port's competitiveness, and its potential to achieve or keep regional or
global hub status, and also to follow its evolution. A brief review of papers measuring port connectivity
based on graph theory is included to illustrate the current approaches in port network analysis, and to
justify our methodological framework. A sub-network of 53 ports directly related with Las Palmas and
Tenerife ports has been selected for this purpose.
Our ndings are mainly related to the connections among the nodes in the sample network, and to
the position that the targeted ports hold. Additionally, some policy recommendations, regarding how to
improve the connectivity and competitiveness of the Canarian ports, are also enumerated. Previous
analysis indicates that, at present, the Las Palmas port is the only regional hub in the Canaries. Both
Canarian port authorities should differentiate themselves by specializing in certain valued added services
and increasing trafc in these services. This would avoid the danger of a destructive competition between them to attract transit trafc. In summary they should be proactive in maintaining and improving
the main Canarian ports' connectivity.
& 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords:
Container ports
Port competitiveness
Port connectivity
Port accessibility
Canary Islands ports
Transport networks

1. Introduction
As interchangers between sea and land transportation modes,
ports constitute a central element within any transportation system, and by extension for the economy as a whole. The signicance of a port is even greater for the economy in island regions where practically the totality of goods enter and leave
through ports. This is the case for the Canary Islands whose
tourism-based economy is highly dependent on the sea transport
that satises the needs of the population and the millions of
n

Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: btovar@daea.ulpgc.es (B. Tovar),
rdobleh@hotmail.com (R. Hernndez),
hecro459@student.liu.se (H. Rodrguez-Dniz).
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.tranpol.2014.11.001
0967-070X/& 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

tourists visiting the islands each year. Signicant levels of connectivity contribute to the competitiveness of ports (Lee et al.,
2014), and generate network effects that contribute to the economy (Laird et al., 2005). Moreover, and as Martinez and Hoffmann
(2007) show, connectivity is one of the main determinants of international transport costs, so improving port connectivity is
crucial for keeping transport costs under control.
The Canary Islands form one of Spain's 17 autonomous communities, and are one of the outermost regions of the European
Union. Located in the Atlantic Ocean and consisting of seven islands, they are situated 115 km from the northwest African coast
and are at an average distance of 1750 km from Madrid. The
Canary Islands main ports, Las Palmas and Tenerife, are located in
the islands of Gran Canaria and Tenerife, respectively; together
they accounted for more than 88% of the total freight moved to

B. Tovar et al. / Transport Policy 38 (2015) 4051

and from other geographical areas in 2013. They are managed by

different port authorities.1
Both centrality and intermediacy play a role in dening the
merits of a port as a transshipment hub. Ideally such ports need to
be both central to the market they serve and intermediary to the
shipping lanes linking markets (McCalla, 2008). Las Palmas port is
currently a transshipment hub and the Mediterranean Shipping
Company (MSC), one of the leading global shipping lines worldwide, has channeled part of its operations in the region through it.
On the other hand, Tenerife port, which has the same situation
factors, plans to improve its site factors, in order to be capable of
assuming more international container trafc. Currently, it falls far
short of Las Palmas' port records.
The advantages of having good port connectivity were accrued
to the Canary Islands once one of their ports became an international hub. Due to the global nature of the transshipment business,
where global operators are seeking their own strategies and objectives, it seems sensible to ask whether both port authorities
should cooperate. This might avoid placing themselves in a weaker
position to negotiate with shipping companies, due to
overcapacity.
In the actual context of intense competition and declining
freight rates Asgari et al. (2013) have introduced the idea of cooperation as a potential substitution for competition. They state
cooperation can take the form of (i) horizontal cooperation between/among the ports, (ii) vertical cooperation between the ports
and the shipping company, and (iii) full cooperation among all of
these stakeholders. Moreover, it has been increasingly recognized
that some degree of coordination among ports can enable increases in efciency and in supply chain integration, which far
from reducing competition, in fact increases the ports' competitive
standings. Moreover, the building of cooperative relationships
with other ports allows them to provide a range of incentives to
shippers and operators, in order to attract trade volumes (Merk,
2013).
Therefore, and trying to shed light on the aforementioned argument the aim of the paper is twofold. First, it aims to document
the port infrastructure and superstructure endowment of both the
main Canary Island ports, and to give the rst qualitative approximation of their sea accessibility through an evaluation of
their site and situational factors. The second objective is to complete the previous analysis by providing the rst direct evaluation
of the main Canarian port connectivity based on graph theory.
These are important measurements in establishing the competitiveness of a port (Low et al., 2009), and in measuring its potential
for achieving or keeping hub status, either regionally or globally.
These let us follow future evolution. To this end, in the ensuing
section, a survey on the current state of literature measuring port
connectivity, based on graph theory, is presented.
The paper is structured as follows. In Section 2 we provide a
brief but comprehensive review of studies of port connectivity
using graph theory techniques. Moreover, the Canary Islands main
ports are described. Section 3 describes the data and presents the
methodological issues. Results, discussion and policy implications
are presented in Section 4. Finally, Section 5 presents the most
relevant conclusions and directions for future research.

For a detailed analysis of the port management model in Spain, see Rodrguez-lvarez and Tovar (2012) and Tovar and Wall (2014).

41

2. Background
2.1. Graph theory and port connectivity
Although the introduction of the maritime connectivity concept is relatively recent in the literature, it has rapidly gained
popularity. An increasing number of studies analyze the inuence
of maritime connectivity on different aspects such as maritime
transport cost (i.e. Kumar and Hoffmann, 2002; Wilmsmeier et al.,
2006; Martinez and Hoffmann, 2007; Mrquez-Ramos et al., 2011;
Duval and Utoktham, 2011), port/regional competitiveness (i.e.;
Yeo et al., 2008; Wang and Cullinane, 2008; Verhetsel and Sel,
2009; Freire and Pais, 2011; Yeo et al., 2011) logistics connectivity2
(i.e. Notteboom, 2004; Kronbak and Cullinane, 2011) and maritime
security (i.e. Bichou, 2004; Angeloudis et al., 2007). Relatively a
few studies have analyzed port connectivity using graph theory
(see Table 1).
Roughly dened, graph theory is a branch of mathematics
concerned with how networks can be encoded and their properties measured (Rodrigue et al., 2006). As far as we are aware, the
rst paper to use the twin geographical concepts of centrality and
intermediacy is Fleming and Hayuth (1994). They identify both
characteristics as spatial qualities that enhance the trafc levels of
transportation hubs, and hence indicate which places are strategically located. However, their analysis is qualitative because they
approached both concepts via port throughput, instead of calculating them by constructing a network.
The rst empirical studies that have attempted to measure port
connectivity based on graph theory appear in the 2000s. This is
probably due to the commencement in 2001 of the installation of
Automatic Identication System (AIS) equipment in ships and
ports. This has facilitated easier access to the data demands entailed by the maritime network construction. Table 1 provides an
overview of studies using this technique, and it can be seen that, in
all of them, a maritime network was built using data basically
from two sources: Containerization International (e.g. McCalla
et al., 2005; Cullinane and Wang, 2009 and 2012; Wang and Cullinane, 2014) and Lloyd's Marine Intelligence Unit (e.g. Ducruet
et al., 2010a; Kaluza et al., 2010; Gonzalez et al., 2012).
Regarding the graph denition itself, there is no unanimity on
the circumstances in which a pair of ports should be considered
linked, so as to take into account the complexity of the maritime
networks. Two graph congurations have appeared to deal with
this particular problem, and while some authors do not refer to
this issue many others dene their networks according to this
framework, and perform parallel studies for both models. These
two representations are referred to as Graph of Direct Links (GDL)
and Graph of All Links (GAL). The GDL represents the sequence of
ports a vessel calls at within a liner service (Fig. 1), and results in a
simple approximation of the topology of the network; this is because two ports will be connected, only if they are called at consecutively. GAL, however, includes the consecutive links between
ports on a specic route, and also completely connects the ports of
the service, by making the assumption that ports in the same
service are linked either directly or indirectly. This latter approach
is expected to be a better representation of liner shipping.
These studies can be grouped in terms of the method used to
build the network, and these may adopt important differences in
their respective structures. The rst set of studies uses a network
representation that only includes direct successive calls between
ports, i.e. GDL, (McCalla et al., 2005; Ducruet et al., 2010a; Kaluza
2
Whereas port connectivity is focused on the connectivity among ports, logistics centered connectivity goes a step further and in its analysis includes other
areas inuenced by a port such as foreland and hinterland.

42

Table 1
Studies of port connectivity using graph theory.
Author

Dataa

Sourceb Graph typec,d,e

(A)

(B)

Main measures

Goal

(C)

McCalla et al. (2005)

1994, 90 Caribbean ports 2002, 88 Caribbean

ports SN

CIY

UW

N/S GDL

coefcient
Degree centrality

Analyze the container shipping network and the emergence of transshipment

hubs

Wang and Cullinane

(2008)

2004, World Wide top 10 container ports

WFFCCV

SR, AX

UW, W
(TEUs,NM)

UD

N/S

Principal eigenvector

To assess the competitive position of a port through accessibility

Hu and Zhu (2009)

2006, 878 WWide ports CS

CIO

UW, W(CL)

GDL,
GAL

To study the worldwide maritime transportation network from a complex

network perspective

Cullinane and Wang

(2009)

2004, World Wide top 10 container ports

WFFCCV

CIY, AL

W(TEUs)

UD

N/S

Degree centrality
Betweenness centrality
Clustering coefcient
Nearest neighbors
degree
Port accessibility index

Ducruet et al. (2010a)

1996, 975 WWide ports 2006, 1240 WWide

ports WFFCCV

LMIU

W(TEUs)

N/S GDL

Degree centrality
Betweenness centrality
Vulnerability

To explore the properties of liner shipping networks and their inuence on

the evolution of port hierarchies

Ducruet et al. (2010b)

1996 and 2006, 23 Northeast Asian ports

WFFCCV

LMIU

W(TEUs)

N/S GDL,
GAL

Degree centrality
Betweenness centrality
Vulnerability
Relative diversity index

To investigate how ports are positioned in the Northeast Asian network between 1996 and 2006

Ducruet et al. (2010c)

1996, 307 Atlantic Ports 2006, 351 Atlantic

Ports WFFCCV

LMIU

W(TEUs)

UD

GDL,
GAL

Degree centrality
Betweenness centrality
Vulnerability
Bisecting K-means
clustering

To verify to what extent the hub-and-spoke strategies of ports and ocean

carriers have modied the structure of a maritime network, based on the
Atlantic case

Kaluza et al. (2010)

2007, 951 Ports CS, GCS, BCS

LMIU

W(TEUs)

GDL

Degree centrality
Betweenness centrality
Cluster coefcient
Node strength

To study the spread of invasive species through a complex network of global

cargo ship movements

Wang and Cullinane

(2011)

2010, 18 East Asia 2010, 21 EastWest route

Container ports LSN

AL, CIO

W(TEUs)

N/S

Principal eigenvector
Betweenness centrality
Multiple linkage analysis
Hierarchical clustering

To assess the effects of trafc consolidation on the container port industry

Ducruet and Notteboom

(2012)

1996, 975 WWide ports 2006, 1240 WWide

ports WFFCCV

LMIU

W(TEUs)

UD

GDL,
GAL

Degree centrality
Betweenness centrality
Vulnerability

Analyzes the relative position of ports in the global network through indicators of centrality

Ducruet and Zaidi (2012)

1996, 975 WWide ports 2006, 1240 WWide

ports WFFCCV

LMIU

UW

UD

GDL,
GAL

Degree centrality
Topological decompos.

To discover whether are there bridges (hubs) and communities (clusters) in

maritime network

Cullinane and Wang

(2012)

2010, 18 East Asia 2010, 21 EastWest route

container ports LSN

AL, CIO

W(TEUs)

N/S

Multiple linkage analysis

Hierarchical clustering

To determine an alternative basis for the establishment of a port hierarchy

within a network

Gonzalez et al. (2012)

2008, 584 WWide ports 2010, 861 WWide

ports WFFCCV

LMIU

W(TEUs)

N/S N/S

Degree centrality
Betweenness centrality
Vulnerability

To look at changes in the maritime network prior to and after the crisis

Pais et al. (2012)

Mar 08Feb 09, 1268 Mar 09Feb 10, 1768 Mar LMIU
10Feb 11, 1692 World Wide ports CS and GCS

W(TEUs)

UD

N/S

Degree centrality
Betweenness centrality

To search the way general and containerized trafc has evolved between 2008
and 2011

Wang and Cullinane

(2014)

2010, 18 East Asia 2010, 21 EastWest route

container ports LSN

W(TEUs)

N/S

Multiple linkage analysis

Hierarchical clustering

To assess the effects of freight trafc consolidation on the container port

industry

B. Tovar et al. / Transport Policy 38 (2015) 4051

AL, CIO

The formulation of an index of port accessibility

43

LSN: Liner shipping networks, WFFCCV: World Fleet of Fully Cellular Container Vessels, CS: container ship, GCS: general cargo ship, and BCS: bulk cargo ship.
CIY: Containerization International Yearbook, AL: Alphaliner, AX: Axsmarine, SR: Searates, CIO: Containerization International Online, and LMIU: Lloyd's Marine Intelligence Unit.
c
(A) Edge weight. UW: unweighted, W(C): weighted via C, TEUs: 20-ft Equivalent Units, CL: no. of container lines, and NM: nautical miles.
d
(B) Edge direction. UD: undirected, D: directed, and N/S: not specied.
e
(C) Network representation. GDL: Graph of Direct Links, GAL: Graph of All Links, and N/S: not specied.

Fig. 1. Example of GDL and GAL congurations.

Source: Own elaboration.

Present study

October 2012, 53 World Wide ports CS

AL

W(TEUs)

UD

GDL

Degree centrality
Betweenness centrality
Vulnerability
Port accessibility index

Evaluate the accessibility and connectivity of the main Canarian ports

B. Tovar et al. / Transport Policy 38 (2015) 4051

et al., 2010). The second set uses both GDL and GAL (e.g. Hu and
Zhu, 2009; Ducruet et al., 2010b; Ducruet and Zaidi, 2012). A
variety of strategies are employed, in order to characterize the
relationship between each pair of connected ports; these include
the direction of the itineraries and the addition of weights, which
are also present in the literature.
2.2. The Canary Islands' main ports
The Canary Islands have an excellent strategic position, and
major maritime routes linking the northern and southern hemispheres cross through their geographical area; these maritime
lines channel a signicant percentage of worldwide trade. The
main Canarian ports are currently ranked among the top 10
Spanish ports, in terms of cargo movement. Moreover, looking at
the worldwide rankings, in terms of container throughput, Las
Palmas port is ranked 87 in the top 200 ports worldwide and
Tenerife is ranked 189 (CI-Yearbook, 2011).
A comparison between the two major Canarian ports, in terms
of container trafc throughput and the number of linked ports
worldwide, shows Las Palmas to be the most important port in the
Canary Islands (see Table 2). The Las Palmas port transhipment
trafc, which is mainly container operations, now accounts for
nearly 69% of the total number of handled containers. Tenerife
port, on the other hand, merely focuses its container trafc on the
domestic market.
Following McCalla (2008), it has been noticed that two fundamental geographical factors dene the relative merits of one
port over another: the site characteristics of a port and its geographical situation. The in situ characteristics can be altered
through investment and management; however, the situation
factors are more important since relative location cannot be
managed.
Table 3 below shows the centrality of the main Canarian ports,
and it can be stated that, unlike cases such as Singapore or Marsaxlokk, the main Canarian ports do not have a multi-scale centrality and intermediacy. Neither of them have an important role
in terms of global centrality; however, in terms of hemispheric
centrality, both are almost equidistant from north Europe, southeast Africa and the Mediterranean. At a regional level, the two
Table 2
Container handling at Canarian ports 20082011.
Source: Las Palmas port and Tenerife port Yearbooks 20082011 and Puertos del
Estado statistics 2013.
Year

Las Palmas
port
Tenerife
port

2008
2009
2010
2011
2008
2009
2010
2011

Domestic

T/shipment

TEUs

TEUs

Total TEUs Number

of linked
ports

441,028
353,484
380,572
383,975
357,723
308,724
315,348
319,825

35.72
37.52
35.99
31.16
97.80
96.37
95.19
96.83

793,746
588,655
676,742
848,246
8,046
11,620
15,928
10,455

64.28
62.48
64.01
68.84
2.20
3.63
4.81
3.17

1,234,774
942,139
1,057,314
1,232,221
365,769
320,344
331,276
330,280

448
376
433
n/a
180
195
196
261

44

B. Tovar et al. / Transport Policy 38 (2015) 4051

Table 3
Main Canarian ports' site and situation factors (centrality) 2013.
Source: Distances from http://www.searates.com, and personal communications with terminal operators and websites.
Situation factors (centrality)
Scale

Sailing distance from

To

Las Palmas port

Nautical miles

Tenerife port
Nautical miles

Global (eastwest)

Central America (Manzanillo Panama)

East Coast North America (New York)
East Coast South America (Santos)
Far East (Singapore)
South Africa (Cape Town)
Mediterranean (Marsaxlokk)
North Europe (Rotterdam)
South East Africa (Abidjan)
Canary Islands (S.C. Tenerife)
Canary Islands (Las Palmas)
North East Africa (Dakar)
South Spain (Algeciras)

3,849
3,017
3,707
7,612
4,406
1,736
1,740
1,984
50

844
702

3,789
2,983
3,700
7,629
4,416
1,757
1,737
2,003

50
863
719

Hemispheric (northsouth)

Regional

Site characterstics
Terminal

Las Palmas port

Name
Quay length (m)
Draught (m)
Ship to shore quay cranes
Area (ha)
Management terminal operator
Max. vessel can be accommodated
Average moves per hour and crane

OPCSA
1,780
14 to 18
8
33.2
MSC-JPMorgan-OPCSA
10
2830

main Canarian ports are well located with regard to both south
Spain and northeast African ports. Regarding site characteristics,
two container terminals can be identied at the Tenerife port,
CAPSA y TCT; both of them have similar characteristics in terms of
draught and quay cranes, and both are operated by national entities. There are also two major terminals in Las Palmas port: La
Luz, operated by Grupo Boluda and OPCSA; this second port
terminal, which is part owned by the Mediterranean Shipping
Company (MSC), is the largest terminal with a quay length of
1,780 m and 8 quay cranes. Both terminals, offer draughts of up to
18 m and can operate even with 11,000 TEUs container vessels.
MSC is the only global operator in the Canarian ports. Las Palmas
port currently serves, through its transshipment hub role, one
transshipment foreland market; i.e. the Mediterranean Sea. It can
be concluded that, although both the main Canarian ports have a
similar centrality, they greatly differ in their site characteristics.
In this section, we have presented a qualitative approximation
of the site and situation factors of the main Canarian ports. In
order to provide a more detailed understanding, we will continue
measuring both ports' connectivity through different measures
based on graph theory. We perform our analysis using a variety of
popular measures, in order to assess the connectivity (maritime
degree), centrality/accessibility (betweenness, port accessibility
index) and inter-port dependency (vulnerability) of each port in
the sample. All of these graph-based methodologies are widespread in the current literature (see Table 1) on maritime
networks.

3. Data and methodology

3.1. Database
In order to measure port connectivity, we collated the liner
container trafc data from October 2012. Since the container
shipping companies' statistical data on trafc ows handled by

Tenerife port
La Luz
1,099
11 to 18
5
16.1
Grupo Boluda
4/5
2830

CAPSA
480
14
4
10.5
Grupo TCB
3/4
2830

TCT
697
16
3
15.28
OHL-Davila
2
2830

each pair of ports is supposed to be highly strategic for competition, obtaining the required data is the most difcult aspect of any
network construction process. Under those terms, and considering
a high correlation between the existing shipping capacity and the
actual market demand, and following what other authors such as
Wang and Cullinane (2011) and Gonzalez et al. (2012) have also
considered, the transportation capacity between the pair of ports
is used in the present paper as a faithful representation of the
actual trafc ows in the construction of the network. Our network has been built using data from the Alphaliner database.
The processes to select those ports that make up the nal
network have had several stages. Firstly, using both the main Canarian ports 2011 annual reports, those ports with higher cargo
movement with Las Palmas' and Tenerife's ports were identied;
subsequently, and in order to include only the more relevant ports,
feedback from several port container terminal managers was
considered. Finally, the top performing ports worldwide, in terms
of container throughput, were also considered. The nal sample is
made up of 53 ports, representing 36 countries and covering
twelve different geographical areas as is shown in Fig. 2.
Finally, a key area of concern could be the ports selected for the
study. The selected network may seem too broad, given that Las
Palmas and Tenerife are regional ports where only one of them has
a modest proportion of intercontinental transshipment. We replicate all the calculation with two different network congurations, in order to test the inuence of different network sizes and
compositions on our results. The rst alternative network was
built by removing the large Asian hubs, Shanghai and Singapore,
and Los Angeles port to check the inuence of the most signicant
and/or remote hubs on the Canarian ports connectivity. In this
case, the nal sample consists of fty ports. The second alternative
was built by keeping those ports located in the Atlantic Ocean, so
the nal sample is made up of 42 ports. As we observed no substantial difference between the results from our network and the
two reduced alternative options hereafter, we only report the results referred to in our original network (see Fig. 2).

B. Tovar et al. / Transport Policy 38 (2015) 4051

45

Fig. 2. International maritime routes and ports in the simple.

Source: Las Palmas and Tenerife port authorities' websites.

It is important to highlight that, unlike other authors' papers,

such as Kaluza et al. (2010) and Pais et al. (2012), among others,
our sample includes any shipping company and any vessel moving
containers regardless of size. Finally, using Alphaliner allows us to
obtain the information needed (containerized cargo), avoid considering vessels which have purposes other than stevedoring activities when entering a port; this is in contrast to Ducruet et al.
(2010c).
The data needed some preprocessing, in order to proceed with
the analysis. Each shipping service in the sample provided information related to the origin, destination, intermediate ports of
call and the vessel capacity in TEUs. Therefore, each segment of the
service, including the intermediate stops, was considered as an
individual directed path comprising origin, destination and the
capacity of the link between them. Thus the merging of all these
individual sub-networks, and the aggregation of the vessel capacities for the links for the same origindestination pair, resulted in
the complete network; i.e. a GDL.
3.2. Methodology
The analysis of transport networks and the development of
indicators to measure connectivity using graph theory is not a
recent issue (e.g. Garrison and Marble, 1960; Kansky, 1963). In
spite of that, the study of the connectivity of ports is still a novel
eld of study, although a signicant number of methods of analysis have been used to shed light on the complexity of shipping
networks. These methodologies can be classied, according to
their scope, into network-related and port-related. Network-related indicators are used as a rst approximation of the structure
of the network and for descriptive purposes; and they include the
number of nodes and edges, average path length and network
density. Conversely, results from port-related indicators are useful
to compare and highlight differences between individual ports,
thus allowing a ne-grained analysis of the network under study.
In the present work, both types of indicators were employed to
examine the network, and to assess the connectivity potential of
each of the ports.
3.2.1. Network-related Indicators
The average shortest path length (APL) measures the efciency
of the routes that connect any two nodes in the network. The
smaller the APL is, the more likely it is that the two nodes can be
linked through a small number of steps. Network density indicates
how saturated the network is, in terms of edges and nodes. It is

given by dividing the actual number of edges by the maximum

possible number of edges. The diameter is the longest distance
between any two nodes in the network, and is a measure of network compactness. The network average clustering coefcient
(ACC; Watts and Strogatz, 1998) denotes the presence of regions
with a high edge density among its members; i.e. clusters.
With regard to the global structure of the network, a number of
authors also analyze the presence or absence of the scale-free and
small-world phenomena. The most notable characteristic of a
scale-free network is the presence of hubs; i.e. a few nodes that
exhibit a great connectivity potential compared with the rest of
the elements in the network. Numerous works (e.g. Hu and Zhu,
2009; Ducruet et al., 2010a; see Table 1) study these types of
networks that present a power law relationship within the degree
(i.e. number of connections of each port), and usually corresponds
to a GDL graph representation. On the other hand, small-world
networks (Watts and Strogatz, 1998) are uniformly distributed
networks. The nodes have about the same number of connections,
and are ubiquitous in many real-world applications; for example,
social networks and road maps. Networks with small average path
length (APL) and high clustering coefcient (ACC) values are expected to exhibit small-world behavior. Note that this effect
usually appears when a GAL network is set up, due to the increase
of network density.
3.2.2. Port-related indicators
Among the variety of port-related measures, which assess the
connectivity of individual ports, we focus particularly on degree,
betweenness and the port accessibility index; these are complementary measures that characterize different aspects of the
node connectivity, as is described in Table 4. They offer us a more
complete picture than they give when used in isolation.
The maritime degree represents the number of connections
that a port has, and has become a standard approach for measuring the connectivity potential of every node in the network, as
Table 4
Relevant characteristics of node connectivity indicators.
Measure

Weighting Scope

Degree
Betweenness

No
No

Port accessibility index TEUs

Purpose

Local
Connectivity/accessibility
Global Connectivity/centrality/
intermediacy
Global Economical accessibility/
attractiveness

46

B. Tovar et al. / Transport Policy 38 (2015) 4051

it is strongly correlated to the port throughput in TEUs. Degree can

be formalized for a port i as

Deg (i) =

Aij + Aji

where Aij is the adjacency matrix, in which Aij = 1 if the port i is

connected to port j , and 0 otherwise.
The betweenness centrality quanties the prominence of a
node, in terms of connectivity within a network (Freeman, 1977;
Brandes, 2001), by computing how frequently a node lies on the
shortest path between any other two nodes. It is given by

CB(v) =

s v t V

st (v)
st

where st is the number of minimum length paths connecting

nodes s V and t V , and st (v) is the number of such paths
which some v V lies on. Ports with high levels of betweenness
are strategically placed close to the main lines of maritime transport, and therefore they are in a privileged, central position in
comparison with the rest of their peers.
Accessibility and connectivity are key elements in transport
networks, since they measure the capacity either of a node to be
reached or the capacity to reach other nodes. However, the literature has been somewhat restricted to topological-based indices
like betweenness,3 and thus fails to take advantage of factors such
as TEUs in the network analysis. Cullinane and Wang (2009) developed a measure of economic accessibility based on the maximum transportation capacity (TEUs/day) between ports, in order
to assess the nodal accessibility of each element in a shipping
network. They dene the daily maximum transportation capacity
between each pair of ports using a weighted graph (valued graph
connection matrix, L ), which is calculated as follows:

L = Vij =

Tckij
k

Fk
365

where Tckij is the average vessel capacity in TEUs and Fk is the

annual frequency of the liner service k between ports i and j . If we
are to consider not only direct connections between nodes, but
also indirect paths of length n, the valued accessibility matrix will
be given by

T = L + L2 + L3 + + Ln
The value n should be equal to the diameter of the network (the
distance between the farthest nodes-3 in the present case). Finally,
the sum across the rows of T corresponds to the desired indicator.
Thus, accessibility becomes a measure of port competitiveness in
terms of container movements or, in other words, how attractive a
port is as a cargo hub.
Finally, the vulnerability of a port is dened as the share of its
total trafc that is shared through its most relevant link. This
measure is intended to identify ports that depend on a few connections, and to reveal hubsubsidiary relationships between
ports. Ports with high levels of degree are expected to be less
vulnerable, and due to their diversication are able to maintain
their status in the shipping network.
3
While the use of weighted graphs is widespread in the literature (see Table 1), the actual computation of accessibility/centrality measures has in many
cases been based on unweighted algorithms. For example, the popular tools Gephi
(e.g. Gonzalez et al., 2012; Pais et al., 2012) and Tulip (e.g. Ducruet et al. 2010a,
2010b, 2010c; Ducruet and Notteboom, 2012) have their implementations of betweenness centrality based on Brandes' algorithm, a very fast method for the calculation of unweighted betweenness (Brandes, 2001). These tools are open source
software, and their source code is freely available on the internet.

4. Results and discussion

4.1. Analysis of the Canarian main ports' network
In line with most studies on transport networks, we represent
our maritime network as a graph. In this particular case, undirected and TEUs-weighted edges are the preferred strategy, in
order to represent the one-to-one relationship between each pair
of ports. We obtained a network with n = 53 nodes and m 625
edges (network density 0.45). Some interesting ndings can be
revealed, if we take a closer look at the resulting network; the
presence of the small-world phenomena being the most noticeable. In this case, an extremely low average path length (1.58) and
network diameter (3) are found to be the case. Most nodes in the
network are directly connected or share a common hub, while any
node can be accessed in a maximum of three steps. Also, the value
of the network average clustering coefcient (ACC0.71) indicates
that our network is highly clustered. Additionally, the degree
distribution of the sample seems to follow a power law
( y = 141.25x1.73, R2 = 0.82), which is one of the representative
features of the so-calledscale-free networks. As a result of this
evidence, we claim that our maritime network is small-world and
scale-free. Similar conclusions are obtained by, among others,
Guimer et al. (2005) and Kaluza et al. (2010) for their respective
papers on worldwide air transportation network and the global
cargo shipping network.
Table 5 presents the results on degree, betweenness and vulnerability ranked for each port in our network, from better to
worse. Regarding betweenness, Hamburg port along with Shanghai, Asia's largest gateway, hold joint rst positions for both indicators, highlighting their statuses as major ports in their respective markets. The second position, held by Shanghai, is due to
the bias the sample has towards the European market, which is
derived from the fact that we have constructed a Canarian port
based network. This also explains why eight of the top 10 ports are
European.
Regarding the Spanish ports, the results are as expected as
Algeciras, Valencia and Barcelona are listed among the top 10 in
the ranking for both indicators. As for the Canarian ports, the
differences in the ranking between Las Palmas port and Tenerife's
port are noticeable; Las Palmas' port has an important number of
direct connections (degree) and is ranked 24th in the betweenness
assessment. Tenerife port holds the lowest positions in the ranking
for both indicators.
Fig. 3 lets us visualize the main Canarian port shipping network
through two indicators, degree centrality and betweenness centrality. This gure was created using Gephi software and a forcedirected algorithm to distribute nodes. Force-directed algorithms
are used to generate a compact display of a network whereby the
most relevant nodes are located in the center of the graph, while
the less important ones are left on the periphery. The relative
position of each port related to degree centrality and betweenness
centrality is represented by a hierarchy of size and a color scale,
respectively. As expected, nodes like Shanghai, Hamburg and
Rotterdam are the best connected in the network. On the second
level, as expected again, we found important European ports, such
as Le Havre, Algeciras, Valencia and Barcelona due to their pivotal
hubs and/or gateway roles; New York was also included here. One
interesting case to be considered is Jebel Ali; this port, ranked
among the top 10 ports in terms of container throughput worldwide (CI-Yearbook 2011). It is the major port on the Rotterdam
Shanghai route, but it has a low ranking in terms of connected
ports. Hence, Jebel Ali port is assessed high in terms of betweenness centrality with a lower degree. Regarding the Canarian ports,
when analyzing the structure of a maritime network based on the

B. Tovar et al. / Transport Policy 38 (2015) 4051

47

Table 5
Port-based measures 2012.
Source: Own elaboration.
Port

Degree

Port

Betweenness

Port

Vulnerability

Hamburg
Shanghai
Le Havre
Rotterdam
Algeciras
New York
Valencia
Lisbon
Tangier
Barcelona
Genoa
Miami
Singapore
Santos
Bremerhaven
Felixstowe
Manzanillo-Pan
Durban
Rio de Janeiro
Las Palmas
Cape Town
Jebel Ali
Cartagena
Abidjan
Dakar
Lome
Buenos Aires
Los Angeles
Montevideo
Freeport
Tema
Callao
Kingston
Douala
La Spezia
Ngqura
Valparaiso
Leixoes
Port Said
San Antonio
Walvis Bay
Guayaquil
Manzanillo-Mex
Port of Spain
La Guaira
Southampton
Montreal
Colon
Puerto Cabello
Damietta
Tenerife
Tampico
Port Sudan

45
44
41
41
40
38
38
36
36
35
34
32
32
31
30
30
30
29
29
28
27
27
26
23
23
23
22
22
22
21
21
19
19
18
17
17
17
16
16
15
15
14
14
14
13
13
12
11
11
10
9
3
1

Hamburg
Shanghai
Jebel Ali
Rotterdam
Le Havre
Valencia
Algeciras
New York
Barcelona
Tangier
Lisbon
Durban
Genoa
Miami
Cape Town
Abidjan
Manzanillo-Pan
Santos
Felixstowe
Bremerhaven
Singapore
Rio de Janeiro
Cartagena
Las Palmas
Los Angeles
Freeport
Kingston
Lome
Callao
Dakar
Valparaiso
Manzanillo-Mex
La Spezia
Tema
La Guaira
Leixoes
Douala
Port of Spain
Buenos Aires
Montevideo
Port Said
Walvis Bay
Montreal
Guayaquil
San Antonio
Colon
Ngqura
Southampton
Puerto Cabello
Damietta
Tenerife
Port Sudan
Tampico

1
0.919
0.765
0.666
0.559
0.513
0.508
0.488
0.484
0.374
0.340
0.336
0.326
0.312
0.302
0.239
0.237
0.210
0.205
0.203
0.185
0.171
0.139
0.115
0.093
0.078
0.072
0.059
0.053
0.048
0.040
0.037
0.036
0.035
0.034
0.025
0.024
0.024
0.023
0.023
0.023
0.020
0.018
0.018
0.018
0.017
0.015
0.011
0.011
0.002
0.001
0.000
0.000

Lisbon
Algeciras
Manzanillo-Pan
Lome
Douala
Las Palmas
Valencia
Tangier
Kingston
Ngqura
Shanghai
Miami
Tema
Rotterdam
Guayaquil
Felixstowe
Le Havre
Hamburg
Freeport
Bremerhaven
Montreal
Abidjan
New York
Genoa
Montevideo
Walvis Bay
La Guaira
Cape Town
Santos
Cartagena
Port Said
Dakar
Barcelona
Southampton
Puerto Cabello
San Antonio
Rio de Janeiro
Buenos Aires
Durban
Port of Spain
La Spezia
Manzanillo-Mex
Colon
Callao
Valparaiso
Tampico
Singapore
Leixoes
Damietta
Jebel Ali
Tenerife
Los Angeles
Port Sudan

0.116
0.117
0.121
0.133
0.133
0.135
0.141
0.146
0.156
0.163
0.166
0.168
0.168
0.171
0.173
0.173
0.182
0.190
0.197
0.199
0.204
0.207
0.208
0.213
0.219
0.220
0.226
0.230
0.232
0.233
0.240
0.245
0.248
0.254
0.258
0.271
0.272
0.273
0.288
0.290
0.297
0.302
0.306
0.309
0.332
0.333
0.367
0.417
0.468
0.484
0.542
0.574
1

Atlantic case Ducruet et al. (2010c) state other clusters are

characterized by very local cycles such as the Canary cluster, although the latter have a peculiar structure as they connect virtually all Atlantic regions despite their smaller size. Fig. 3 shows
the important differences between both ports, in terms of degree
and betweenness. Las Palmas is much better connected than Tenerife, and is better positioned to compete for transit cargo than
some of its potential competitors; e.g. Dakar. Moreover, Ducruet
et al. (2010a) hypothesize that hub ports will have both a high
degree and betweenness due to their role as inter-regional pivots
in the global network. Fig. 3 seems to conrm that hypothesis,
showing that the main hubs in our network present this
characteristic.
Maritime shipping services have a degree of geographical
exibility because shipping lines can modify their routes according

to internal circumstances, such as strategic alliances and nancial

capacities, and to external factors related to maybe technological
improvement or economic downturn. As a consequence, maritime
networks change as time passes, and also a port's position in the
network may change. So, another important aspect to analyze is
the vulnerability of a port's position to changes in the network.
Table 5 also shows a port's vulnerability calculated as the share of
the largest ow link within the total port trafc. Regarding Canarian ports, Las Palmas' port has a better position than Tenerife's
port because its trafc is better distributed. On the other hand,
Tenerife's dominant link is Las Palmas' port (54.2%) and 91% of its
trafc is concentrated on only ve links, four of them located in
the Iberian Peninsula. Finally, Fig. 4 shows the relationship between vulnerability and degree. As expected, the higher the degree the lower the vulnerability. That is, ports with a higher degree

48

B. Tovar et al. / Transport Policy 38 (2015) 4051

Fig. 3. Graph visualization of the main Canarian port shipping network 2012.
Source: Own elaboration using Gephi software and a force-directed algorithm.
Table 6
Port accessibility index 2012.
Source: Own elaboration (container throughput data from Alphaliner database).

Fig. 4. Port vulnerability versus degree 2012.

Source: Own elaboration.

have their trafc more evenly distributed among their links than
the others. In spite of that, there are some exceptions like Jebel Ali
and Singapore, which have a great dependency on Shanghai: 48%
and 37% of their total trafc, respectively. The relationship between both indicators again shows the weaker position of Tenerife's port when compared to Las Palmas' port.
Results also provide information regarding economic accessibility which is measured by means of the port accessibility index
dened in Section 4.2. Table 6 below presents the port accessibility
results.4 The ranking is led by the two major Asian ports, Shanghai
and Singapore; next are Rotterdam and Hamburg, the two most

4
We remark that the PAI, unlike degree and betweenness takes into account
weighted links (TEUs).

Rank Port

Port accessibility index TEUs throughoutput 2012

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9

11

20

22

34

51
52
53

1
0.9287
0.6414
0.6198
0.5987
0.5079
0.4724
0.4710
0.3387

0.2694

0.1551

0.1321

0.0440

0.0023
0.0017
0.0001

Shanghai
Singapore
Rotterdam
Hamburg
Jebel Ali
Felixstowe
Le Havre
Bremerhaven
Valencia

New York

Santos

Manzanillo-Pan

Las Palmas

Tenerife
Port Sudan
Tampico

67,822,092
30,727,821
28,920,923
26,030,784
17,216,511
20,293,129
23,512,256
21,550,950
19,191,757

12,618,667

10,594,720

9,473,682

3,284,804

326,239
118,249
13,345

important European ports in terms of container throughput. Valencia, the rst Spanish port ranked in the list, is located among
the top 10, whereas Las Palmas' port is ranked 31st and Tenerife's
port is again among the lowest rated ports in the sample. Table 6
also shows the container throughput in TEUs for each of the ports
in 2012; by including this information, the relationship between
throughput and the positions that ports hold in the index is
compared. As Cullinane and Wang (2009) state, the accessibility
ranking ports hold should be generally consistent with their annual throughput rankings, and those ranked higher in terms of
throughput can be considered to be more competitive.
The ports in the sample are ranked, with some exceptions,

B. Tovar et al. / Transport Policy 38 (2015) 4051

according to what Cullinane and Wang (2009) state. Shanghai and

Singapore are both jointly located in rst position in the Port Accessibility Index presented above, and are the ports with the
highest level of throughput; those with lowest throughput are
ranked at the bottom. A consultation of the Canarian ports shows
the prevalence of Las Palmas' port. It is important to remember
that the sample is biased in favor of the European area. Those ports
in our sample, which should be positioned in the top of the
ranking, are affected by this fact; this explains why six out of the
top nine ports are Europeans.
4.2. Policy implications
Previous analysis indicates that, at present, the Las Palmas port
is the only regional hub in the Canaries. Since different port authorities manage the Canary Islands' main ports, they could be
tempted to compete for transshipment cargoes.
To attend to transit cargoes a port must have suitable facilities
and infrastructure, which imply huge investments. Moreover, the
demand which port terminals face is characterized by a degree of
uncertainty that varies depending on the trafc mix. Rodrguezlvarez et al. (2011) and Tovar and Wall (2012) have analyzed this
phenomenon using data on three5 port terminals located in Las
Palmas' port, and concluded that the terminal whose volume of
transshipment is the most considerable faces greater demand
variability than the other two. They concluded that demand
variability affects rm input choices and costs. Tovar and Wall
(2014) reached the same conclusion using a panel data set of 26
Spanish port authorities observed over the period 19932007.
As load centers, whose competitive strategy is based largely on
an intermediary role, hubs ports are in an unstable and delicate
position. This is because, once infrastructure has been built, it has
no alternative use; and it is also because this kind of trafc is very
volatile and totally depends on the strategies of shippers with
regard to their service. Likewise, inability within a region to generate sufcient transshipment trafc will increase rivalry for
available business. Rivalry for transshipment business is intense,
even for ports that have established leading positions as load
centers. These rivalries create substantial pressure on transshipment pricing. Strong competition and fear of underutilization of
terminal infrastructure and equipment could exert downward
pressure on tariffs and port terminals. Carriers use their bargaining
power with the aim of achieving signicant discounts on port
dues.
Until 2003, Spanish ports were subject to legislation that left
them with no control over pricing policies. Rodrguez-lvarez and
Tovar (2012) investigated the efciency of Spanish port authorities
over the period 19932007 and found evidence of inefcient behavior, with inefciency worsening from 2003. Overinvestment in
capacity is likely to be the main driver of this result. As a consequence of not having control over pricing policies, the competitive strategy of ports rested on the manipulation of those variables under their control, the most relevant of which was investment policy. This led to a massive increase in infrastructural investment during the period 19932008, resulting in signicant
expansions of port capacity over this period (Garcia et al., 2010).
Following Castillo-Manzano and Asensio-Flores (2012) this process
was for two reasons eased. First, because the port system succeeded in attracting new sources of funding: the European Regional Development Fund, revenue from the management of real
estate and the greater involvement of the private sector in the
5
As we have seen in Section 2, currently there are two terminals in Las Palmas'
port, although until 2010 there were three. In this year, one of them stopped operating due to nancial problems.

49

owning and management of the infrastructure. Secondly, because

the port system succeeded in spectacularly increasing the amount
of debt that the Spanish port authorities still owe to nancial
institutions.
Recent legislation has introduced important changes, and the
33/2010 Law and 2/2011 Decree have endowed port authorities
with increased autonomy and control over policy (Tovar and Wall,
2014). In their recent paper, Castillo-Manzano and Asensio-Flores
(2012) talked about Iberian Peninsula ports, and warned of the
existence of a potential risk for port tariff price wars. They point to
the lack of cooperation between Spain and Portugal in the eld of
transport, the huge capacity of many ports and the greater freedom of Spanish port authorities to set tariffs as factors underlying
this situation. They continue stating, This war will lead to a further
drag on many ports economic results, especially the medium- and
small-sized ports that, generally-speaking have smaller margins for
lowering their tariffs. In this context, and despite all the ruthless
competition to corner the international container transshipment
market, there might be the possibility, and the need, for a greater
cooperation.
The previous discussion offers important lessons; because it
shows a scenario similar to what the Canarian port authorities
could suffer if they do not cooperate. The question then arises as to
what extent the two Canarian port authorities can differentiate
themselves. For example, they might specialize in certain valued
added services and increase trafc in these services, in order to
avoid the danger of a destructive competition to attract transit
trafc. As Wilmsmeier and Monios (2013) state a small shift in
the trafc to another port may undermine the viability of the port
business.
It is well known that maritime networks are dynamic in character. Due to the high dependence of the Canarian economy on sea
transport, and the well-known relation between connectivity and
transport costs, both port authorities should be proactive in
maintaining and improving Las Palmas' and Tenerife's port connectivity. To do this, both port authorities should take advantage of
the existing instruments that the new port legislation has made
available, in order to create a favorable climate to attract private
initiatives. These initiatives would serve for the provision of port
services and attract private investment in port infrastructure.
However, it would avoid incurring an infrastructure overcapacity
for transit cargo that could place the Canary port system in a very
complicated nancial situation.
One of the main instruments available for ports relies on the
possibility of tailoring their policies to differentiate themselves
according to their needs. In fact, the new Act 33/2010 creates a
exible pricing model, so that each port authority is able to adapt
to the economic reality at any moment. This law could contribute
to facilitating the necessary coordination between both port authorities because as a recent paper (Yip et al., 2014) suggests the
preferences of port authorities over inter-port competition is inuenced by factors such as service differentiation among competing ports, market size and service quality differentials.

5. Conclusion
After performing a qualitative approximation of site and situation factors of the main Canarian ports, it is certain that the Las
Palmas port transshipment feature differs from the ongoing reality
at the Tenerife port. The latter merely focuses its container trafc
on the domestic market, and its transshipment record has not
even reached 5% of the containers handled yearly in the period
under consideration. Meanwhile transshipment operations in Las
Palmas' port have reached a rate close to 69% of the total number
of containers handled.

50

B. Tovar et al. / Transport Policy 38 (2015) 4051

For quantitative approximations, we have utilized graph theory.

Both network-related and port-related indicators were employed,
in order to examine the network as a whole and to assess the
connectivity potential of each of the ports. Previous analysis indicates that Las Palmas' port is the only regional hub in the Canaries, but its transshipment role in the network is outperformed by
its main competitors in terms of transshipment trafc. Tangiers,
Algeciras and Valencia are in a better position than Las Palmas'
port.
Recent literature acknowledges that inter-port coordination
can be seen as a strategic response to a competitive environment
(e. g. Castillo-Manzano and Asensio-Flores, 2012; Asgari et al.,
2013). This generates a whole that is larger than the sum of its
parts, and improves information transfer, supply chain integration
and the effective allocation of infrastructure (Merk, 2013). For this
reason, and once the Canary Islands enjoy good port connectivity,
the Canarian government should encourage inter-port coordination between both the Canarian port authorities.
Along these lines, the Basque government recently put forward
a proposal for a possible cooperation protocol among the Bilbao,
Pasaia and Bermeo port authorities. The main objective of this
agreement is to establish a framework for collaboration that would
contribute to improving the competitiveness of the Basque port
system and further develop and utilize their potential. This objective is to be pursued by coordinating actions to improve ports,
by facilitating joint optimization strategies, by exploiting synergies
to streamline ows and by promoting collaborative management
to make it more efcient and sustainable.
The Basque Competition Authority has issued a negative report
in relation to the latter proposal. It notes that this may violate the
rules of competition with varying degrees of intensity in those
areas that affect the commercial or economic work of the ports.
While we recognize that it is necessary to create market conditions that do not violate competition rules, it is also important to
avoid destructive competition for transshipment cargo between
port authorities. This is especially true if they are providing services to an archipelago or small set of islands, where one of them
has already reached the necessary maritime connectivity. We believe that the present study could shed light on the previous discussion, and contribute to the recent literature defending interport coordination as a strategic response to a competitive
environment.
From the methodological viewpoint, future research should
focus on using variants of the standard techniques (e.g. RodrguezDniz et al., 2013), in order to take advantage of as many variables
as possible (vessel frequency, TEUs and geographical distance).
It could be also interesting to focus on building different subnetworks based on the most important competitors that the Canarian ports have (e.g. Tangiers, Algeciras). This would shed light
on the positions of the Las Palmas and Tenerife ports within those
subnetworks, and would have the aim of dening strategies that
could help to improve their competitiveness in transshipment
trafc in the region. Both port authorities should be proactive in
maintaining and improving port connectivity at Las Palmas and
Tenerife.

Acknowledgements
We wish to acknowledge that a temporary trial version of the
Alphaliner website database, with full access to the information
needed to carrying out this research, was provided by Alphaliner
commercial. This research was partially funded with Grant
HAR2010-17408 from Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovacin (Spain). A
Previous version of this paper has been presented in the

International Association of Maritime Economists Annual Conference, IAME2013, celebrated in Marseille, France.

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