Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic to Maritime Trade and Port Performance in the Philippines

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused unprecedented challenges in several international economic domains, having an impact on port operations and maritime trade globally. By doing a thorough analysis of ship movements, domestic container traffic, and their correlation with GDP fluctuations, this research explores the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on the maritime trade of the Philippines. The study begins by looking at the changes in container movement in the Philippine ports as well as the changes in both trade and import activity. The research aims to identify statistical changes and trends by means of comparative analysis of the data before pandemic and after pandemic. Our research findings indicate a decline in the number of ships entering Philippine ports, attributed to a range of factors. Notably, health concerns and disruptions in the supply chain have played pivotal roles. The intricacies of delivering goods to the vessel for shipments are distinct from ensuring timely approval and processing crucial aspects such as onboarding and offboarding procedures. The estimation of parameters and the determination of model significance were carried out through the application of simple linear regression. This analytical approach involved utilizing statistical methods to ascertain the relationships between variables, allowing for the extraction of meaningful parameters and the assessment of model significance within the given context.