Zentralverband der Deutschen Seehafenbetriebe (ZDS) has denounced the difference in treatment, in particular by tax point of view, to which terminal operators are subjected German dockers and container shipping companies, recrimination which the association of German port undertakings has shouted to the four winds not addressing it directly or to national or international institutions or bodies. It is However, of a complaint that the German association has formulated more times through the voice of the European federation Feport to which adheres and which is aimed at blocking the powerful push to verticalization of activities impressed in recent years from the world's leading liner shipping carriers that are extending their scope to port operations, and terrestrial logistics.

"The maritime transport and the ports - observed the General Director of the German Association, Daniel Hosseus - I am Two different sectors and maritime transport lives in one world all his own." A world outside the rules, it seems to imply the general manager of ZDS, who however does not invite expressly someone to ask them, which moreover has repeatedly already done Feport, for example by associating with other European and international associations to the request addressed to the European Commission to revise the exemption regulation for category for containerised sea carriers, Regulation the EU has repeatedly extended and will expire on 25 April 2024 ( of 24 March 2020 and 22 July 2022).

Referring to the substantial profits recorded in the last two years from the world's leading containerized shipping companies, Hosseus has specified that "the port sector has nothing to be gained from the record profits of shipping, indeed! In the sector of the maritime transport of containers - he protested - currently The tax rate is less than 1% and the basic rules of the competition are suspended. Liner shipping companies - has emphasized Hosseus - enter into formal agreements between them concerning to the offer. On the contrary, in ports and land logistics We have very strong competition, international and, above all, effective, and we pay taxes like any other industry."

"Therefore - Hosseus remarked - it is a problem serious when liner shipping uses throughout the world its profits almost tax-free to enter the business of port handling and land logistics and He also uses his special privileges there. Can't to be right - he explained - that, in this ruthless competition global, two companies doing the same job are You tax and regulate so differently. Apply double standards. If anything - underlined the director general of ZDS - special rules for shipping companies containerized can only be applied on water and must end at the edge of the quay." It seems an implicit invitation to European and German institutions, which seem unable to Stop the overwhelming power of containerized shipping companies on the sea, to do something because this unchallenged strength Marittima does not go ashore more than it already has done.