Piraeus container traffic slumps in March

The effects of the coronavirus pandemic are being felt at the port of Piraeus, with Cosco announcing the first quarterly decline in container handling after several years.

The figures for the first quarter of the year showed that the container terminals that Cosco’s subsidiary Piraeus Container Terminal operates posted a 2.4 percent decline from the same period in 2019 as the number of containers handled came to 1,215,875, down from 1,246,007 last year.

March was the only month of decline in the quarter, but this was by a considerable 15.4 percent annual rate from March 2019.