The European Union should support entire chains such as in the port industry and logistics instead of individual projects in order to drive climate neutrality.
This was pointed out at the eighth German-Finnish Port Day held in Lübeck, Germany, on November 7, 2023.
During the one-day event, it was stressed that the ports should tackle the challenges of the future together, focus on specific technologies and advance them step by step.
The close cooperation between Germany and Finland should become an engine of growth and innovation in the Baltic Sea region and thus in Northern Europe. Both countries could jointly develop and successfully market solutions for climate neutrality. The port industry in particular is already a driver here.
“Innovative strength is the region’s theme through which we define ourselves. Traditionally, the Baltic Sea countries are at the forefront of changes within the European Union. This region represents three percent of the top companies worldwide that advance research and development,” Christian Ketels , Expert on Economic competitiveness and Strategy at Harvard Business School, said.
“The key to success lies in cooperation. The port industry wants to be at the forefront of the movement. We are an environmentally friendly region and are already a pioneer in reducing emissions in the Baltic Sea region. The ship-rail combination in particular is low in emissions,” Sebastian Jürgens , Managing Director of Lübecker Hafen-Gesellschaft mbH (LHG) and the host of the event, commented.
For Bernd Jorkisch , a German entrepreneur, the Baltic Sea region is an area of opportunity that has a great future ahead of it, despite the many tensions and changes caused by the energy transition, energy costs and the war in Ukraine.
“The northern European countries are doing significantly better in terms of GDP debt than the southern European countries,” he emphasized, adding that the closer cooperation between the two countries is promising, with Germany being Finland’s largest trading partner for ten years.
“Baltic Sea opportunity area – absolutely! But how do we transform an area of opportunity into an area of success?” One possibility would be to use the challenges to save the fragile Baltic Sea ecosystem to develop new products and services for which there is a market in the region, in Europe and also worldwide,” Ketels concluded.