Justine Camoin, Project Manager at MGI and European Vice-President of the IAPH Women’s Forum.
Justine Camoin, Project Manager at MGI and European Vice-President of the IAPH Women’s Forum, spoke about “KPIs, a tool for Smart Ports” during the IAPH(International Association of Ports and Harbors) Port Community Systems and Trade Facilitation technical committee meeting, which was held at the 29thinternational IAPH conference in Hamburg on the theme of Smart Ports.

Ports generally use statistics to calculate the number of ships docking, the number of containers imported or exported, and the flow of containers loaded and unloaded per hour.This data often relies entirely on the results of a singleport operator.

The performance of a “Smart Port” should be measured by taking into account the contribution of all operators in completion of a task. Port Community Systems are the best placed to offer detailed performance analysis based on goods coming through ports, taking into account all tasks completed.

The AP+ PCS, developed by MGI and SOGET allows to timestamp every change of status of each container, in particular its entry (Unloading status for imports and Reception for exports) and departure (collection for imports and loading for exports) from the port area. These import and export indicators give the average time goods spend in the port area. It incorporates the work performed by the terminal operator, freight forwarder, shipping agent, customs agent and road, river or rail transporter. The longer this time is, the higher the demurrage and detention fees. This is an important indicator for shippers.

The Via Marseille Fos (VMF) association produces KPIs for Marseille Fos port, based on shipping performance, goods handling performance (using data from AP+) and land transport performance.

They produce a detailed overview of the port community’s overall competitiveness, and provide shippers, logistics professionals, transport organisers, ship owners and transport operators with a reliable estimation of the port’s productivity. The KPIs published by VMF are one of a kind.

ESPO has established a list of KPIs based on environmental, socio-economic and logistics performance as part of its PPRISM project (Port PeRformance Indicators: Selection and Measurement) (, which is co-funded by the European Commission. The aim is to set up an Observatory for the European port system.

Find out more about the IAPH.