While Panama is fifth in the world in port infrastructure it is 51st as a logistics hub and facing competition from other ports in the region.

In a blog from the Chamber of Commerce, Industries and Agriculture of Panama, Albert White Aguila writes:

“According to the World Economic Forum’s Competitiveness Report for 2011-2012, Panama is now the fifth country in the world with the best quality port infrastructure. The challenge now is to improve our position as a logistics center, as we currently occupy position 51 worldwide.

Panama has made significant investments in its port terminals; its capacity will increase to 7 million TEUs a year when the expansion and construction of so-called mega ports is completed. However, given the growth of investment in other Latin American ports, Panama’s logistics sector and all other elements should be especially dedicated to maintaining a constant growth rate, technological upgrades, improvements in industry support and administration of Customs Apparatus in order to achieve short-term growth numbers greater than estimated.

We are taking the right steps to make this important journey, the creation of a Logistics Office and the union of groups from the private logistics sector, will allow us to create state policies to maintain the competitiveness of our port terminals and develop as Americas’ multimodal logistics center.