by Marek Błuś and Przemysław Myszka

The Russian war was probably the singular factor influencing our region's bulk trade last year.

First, the Russians kept supplying the partners they were left trading with - and did so at an increased pace to at least try to stitch the spread between demand and lower commodity prices. The liquid bulk figures for Ust-Luga and Primorsk do all the talking (making up in excess for the losses noted by St. Petersburg and Vysotsk).

The economic situation in the Baltic Sea region in 2022 wasn't all that bad, so tankers continued calling the regional seaports, although from other than Russia directions.

The Baltic large-scale LNG terminals in Świnoujście and Klaipėda also earned their corn by pushing out Russian gas from the region's grids.

At the same time, turning away from Russian coal added to dry bulk imports, with Poland being the prime example as the country scrambled to take in by sea as much coal as possible before the 2022/2023 winter (with Gdańsk almost doubling its overall dry bulk turnover).

Then again, Lithuania's seaport was heavily hit by the disappearance of Belarusian fertilisers previously going over its quays.

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