State-run Philippine Ports Authority said Monday passenger traffic and cargo volume fell in the first quarter amid the outbreak of the coronavirus disease 2019.
Data from PPA showed that total cargo volume reached 56.70 million metric tons from January to March, down by 4.49 percent from 59.37 million MT registered in the same period last year.
Domestic cargoes dropped 3.26 percent in the first quarter to 25.44 million MT from 26.30 million MT a year ago, while foreign cargoes decreased 5.4 percent to 31.26 million MT from 33.06 million.
The PPA said import cargoes fell 5.8 percent to 23.24 million MT from 24.68 MT, while export cargoes declined 4.4 percent to 8.01 million MT from 8.38 million MT.
Container traffic also slowed by 9.5 percent in the first quarter to 1.71 million twenty-foot equivalent units from 1.89 million TEUs in the same period last year.
It said that of the total, domestic containers dropped 7 percent to 728,767 TEUs, while foreign containers retreated by 11.3 percent to 987,476 TEUs.
Meanwhile, passenger traffic slowed down by 8.1 percent in the first quarter to 16.67 million from 18.14 million passengers in the same period last year. Of the total, disembarked passengers reached 9.11 million and embarked passengers stood at 8.26 million.
Cruise passengers posted a 72-percent decline with 31,344 in the first quarter, compared to 112,246 passengers in the first quarter of 2019.
Roll-on/roll-off traffic rose 4.8 percent to 1.82 million passengers from 1.73 million passengers last year.
Ship calls rose 1.4 percent to 119,278 vessels in the first quarter from 117,599 vessels in the same period last year. Of the total, domestic ship calls reached 116,938 vessels and foreign ship calls represented 2,340 vessels.
