Port of Montreal’s box volume flat after nine months

Port of Montreal’s box volume flat after nine months    Container traffic at the port of Montreal during the first nine months of the year rose 0.6 percent to 905,143 TEUs, compared to 899,179 TEUs in the year-earlier period.
   The Canadian port handled 8.3 million tons of containerized cargo after three-quarters this year, up 3.9 percent, or 300,000 tons more than the same period last year.
   “There is no doubt that 2005 will be our fourth consecutive record year for container traffic,” said Dominic J. Taddeo, the Montreal Port Authority’s president and chief executive officer.
   The authority said it witnessed a 10.7 percent increase in non-containerized general cargo traffic, which totaled about 385,000 tons, due to entries of copper anodes and cathodes, and steel products.
   The port handled 4.4 million tons of petroleum products in the first nine months, an 18.3 percent increase over the same period 2004. Liquid-bulk cargo’s increased 18.7 percent to approximately 965,000 tons, while dry bulk cargo declined 1.6 percent to 3.4 million tons.
   At the grain terminal, marine traffic was down 8.4 percent to about 810,000 tons. “This traffic is still feeling the effects of a poor-quality harvest in 2004, but it would have been lower, had it not been for increased exports by corn and soy producers in southwestern Quebec,” the port authority said.