potential to make more efficient use of the infrastructure they already have. Improving the performance of existing ports, enabling them to handle higher levels of cargo with the same facilities and in a shorter time, can be a truly cost-effective approach to reducing transport and trade costs. Doing so can significantly increase the volume of trade.

This paper is the first to focus on ports on the Indian and Western Pacific Oceans and the first to use efficiency measures based on port input and output data, which serve as international benchmarks. The findings show that countries on the Indian and Western Pacific Oceans can significantly benefit from increased efficiency in the use of existing container port facilities. The estimated potential gains for each country help policy makers assessing the importance of improving port performance, and hence prioritizing interventions.

Future research should expand the analysis to all developing regions, in order to understand whether differences in port performance explain difference in maritime transport costs and exports across the developing world. If port level transport costs and trade data were available, future research could also control for heterogeneities among ports and help countries to prioritize interventions in their port sector by identifying ports where efficiency improvements can yield higher reductions in transport costs, and increases in exports.

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