At least six Japanese seaports handling international trade sustained major damage from last week's earthquake, with most seen out of operation for months, disrupting global supply chains and causing billions of dollars in daily losses, industry and port officials said.

Japan has begun assessing the damage to port infrastructure, vital to receiving aid, commodities and goods for rebuilding areas devastated by the deadly 8.9 magnitude quake and tsunami that likely killed more than 10,000 people, reported Reuters.

The northeast coast ports of Hachinohe, Sendai, Ishinomaki and Onahama were so severely damaged by Friday's disaster that they were not expected to return to operation for months, if not years. The ports were considered medium-sized facilities that handle containers, fuel products and dry bulk goods.

"These ports will need a lot of time until they can be fully restored," Tetsuya Hasegawa, operation manager at Heisei Shipping Agencies in Tokyo, told Reuters.

Tokyo and all ports south of Japan's capital were operating normally after briefly shutting down operations following Friday's disaster, while the rest of the country's ports were being assessed for damage, a shipowner and port official said.

The closure of the ports was expected to cost Japan more than US$3.4 billion in lost seaborne trade each day, according to shipping trade publication Lloyd's List Intelligence.

"Ports south of Tokyo are all operational, ports north of Tokyo are still under evaluation," said a shipowner based in Tokyo.
Japan's ninth-largest container port, Kashima, and the smaller port of Hitachinaka sustained milder damage and both could be back in operation within weeks, he said.

Maritime trade in the world's No. 3 economy totalled $1.5 trillion last year, according to Lloyd's List.

Following are details of the six ports most affected by the quake and tsunami.

Ports with severe damage that could take months, if not years, to rebuild are:

Hachinohe (medium-sized container and oil seaport)

– The port's fuel terminals supply the local fishing fleet and US military installations in Japan, Korea and Okinawa.

– With seven fuel terminals, the port has the capacity to store more than 11 million barrels of oil products.

– The port handled more than 310 million gallons of petroleum products in 1997.

– Operates 48 container berths that operates regular international routes to Taiwan, Singapore, Korea, Australia,
South America, Europe, Canada and the United States.

Sendai (medium-sized container, breakbulk seaport)

– Formerly one of the biggest and most efficient container and breakbulk cargo centres in northeastern Japan.

– Exported 57,000 TEUs, almost half of which were rubber products, in 2005. Other cargo included machinery, pulp and paper, and marine products.

– Imported 48,300 TEUs of cargo, including 6,500 TEUs of lumber. It also imported marine products, foods, sporting goods, furniture, dyes, paints and wood products.

Onahama (medium-sized container seaport)

– Handled over 11 million tonnes of containerised cargo in 2000, of which 7.2 million was intra-Asia trade.

– The container port is linked to vessels travelling via South Korea, China, Australia, Southeast Asia and North America.
Ishinomaki (medium-sized dry bulk and breakbulk seaport)

– Handles fertiliser and steel products at two piers, which can accommodate vessels between 1,000 and 2,000 TEUs.

– The Nakajima Pier handles ores and its two berths can accommodate vessels of 2,000 deadweight that carry coke.

– The South Beach Pier has two berths, which can accommodate 10,000 deadweight vessels, that handle raw wood.
Ports with less severe damage that could resume normal operations within weeks are:

Kashima (large-sized container port)

– The ninth largest container port in Japan, handling an estimated 82 million deadweight tonnes of cargo in 2010.
Hitachinaka (medium-sized container, car seaport)

– Handled 994,000 tonnes of cargo in 2001, up more than 300 percent from the previous year. That consisted of 159,000 tonnes of foreign trade.

– Cars, metal products and machine industrial goods made up more than half of all handled cargo. Other goods included sugar, non-ferrous metals, fruits and vegetables and wood products.

Meanwhile, Philippine-based port operator International Container Terminal Services Inc. (ICTSI), said that operations at its container port in Okinawa are back to normal following the Japanese earthquake and tsunami.

“It was closed for a day as a precautionary measure, but operations in Naha [port] are back to normal,’’ ICTSI spokeswoman Narlene Soriano told Dow Jones Newswires.

Soriano said it is yet too early to determine if cargo traffic in Naha port will be adversely affected by the earthquake.
"It is the call of the shipping lines if they will allow their ships to sail to Japan," she said.

ICTSI holds 60 percent of Naha International Container Terminal Inc, the joint venture company that holds a 10-year contract to operate Terminals 9 and 10 of the Japanese seaport starting in 2006.

Source: CargonewsAsia