47 Kobe Throughput: 2,556,300teu (+3.4%)

Declining exports in the final months of 2008 had a devastating impact on Kobe's full-year volumes, along with those at all of Japan's ports, as the country experienced the steepest monthly falls in 50 years for several consecutive months.

However, an 83,492teu growth in container volumes was enough to see Japan's fourth busiest container port maintain its position at number 47 in the table in 2008. In fact, Kobe outperformed all the other ports in Japan's big five – including Tokyo, Yokohama, Nagoya and Osaka – in terms of teu and percentage growth.

Like all Japanese ports, Kobe is expected to have a tougher time this year. In May 2009, Japanese exports fell 40.9% compared with the same month in 2008. Shipments from China showed little sign of improvement and exports to the US fell 45.4% from a year earlier.