FEPORT, the federation of private port terminalists again, called on EU politicians to set standards on the decarbonisation of economic activities, including those - such as the FuelEU Maritime and the revision of the EU ETS - Proposals to reduce the impact of maritime transport on the environment, which do not jeopardise the competitiveness of European ports.

In particular, the fear of FEPORT, already shared from the association of European ports ESPO, is that the of these legislative acts, being limited to the Union European, could damage the competitive position of terminals EU harbours given that - explained the federation of terminal operators - shipping companies will be able to avoid incur financial charges resulting from these rules simply by adding to their services with Europe a stopover in a non-EU port.

In this regard, FEPORT has specified that it has welcomed the measures proposed by the Parliament and the Council of the EU to address this issue in the context of the trialogue negotiations on the FuelEU Maritime and the EU ETS, with particular reference to amendment 63 of the European Parliament's position on FuelEU Maritime regulation requiring the European Commission to continuous monitoring of diversion of maritime services to non-EU posts in order to circumvent environmental standards by penalising EU ports and which also requires the Commission to propose legislative measures to address this problem if it is ascertained a negative impact on EU ports. Appreciation of the Federation of European terminal operators is also aimed at proposals by the Parliament and the Council of the EU to include a Definition of port of call excluding ship stops in ports non-EU transhipment containers. Specifically, FEPORT did Reference to amendment 492 defining, as a port of transhipment, "a port of transhipment in a neighbouring country does not EU at a distance of less than 300 nautical miles from an EU port, in which the handling of a type of load with the mode of transhipment activity exceeds 60% of traffic total of that port".

According to FEPORT, however, this may not be the case. sufficient to discourage shipping companies from diverting mother ships to non-EU ports to then serve European ports only with feeder container ships. 'The ports of the EU - has warned the federation - they could lose goods in a way irreversible if the risks related to the diversion of goods do not will be properly monitored and if the EU ETS does not It will be implemented gradually through successive phases."