The new giants

摘要

As PSA International squares up to DP World over control of P&O, it looks increasingly like a three-horse race with Hutchison for global port dominance. And the two horses seeking P&O are owned and ridden by their governments. The retreat by governments from the maritime industry has been one of the more welcome developments of the past two decades. Shipoperators have watched , with satisfaction as the interfering fingers of governments and dock unions have been prised away from the port industry, and have seen the process as irreversible. The EU is trying - with diminishing optimism - to revive its despised Ports Directive (Fairplay Daily News, 11 January) and even Italy has rejected a move to allow more government control of its ports (see p10).