Assessment of port governance model: evidence from the Brazilian ports

Abstract

PurposeSince enacting Act 8630/93, Brazilian port activities have been going through significant modifications, changing from the public port service management to the landlord model. Act 12815/2013 enforced a new regulatory framework increasing Port Authorities' dependence on the Federal Government. Since 2019, the Government has attempted to elaborate a Port Authorities' identity based on the private port governance model inspired by the Australian and United Kingdom ones. This paper assesses Brazilian's Port Authorities management models from 1993 to 2020 and considers the Australian, the United Kingdom and Antwerp port governance models as benchmarks.Design/methodology/approachThis paper adopts a two-step methodological approach, namely a combined desk and field research methodological approach and considers three essential resources: government legislative acts and published data available online; ports' data and information issued by governments' agencies, academic papers and national and international ports' websites; and a semi-structured questionnaire survey targeting the leading associations representing port users, foreign trade and stevedoring companies.FindingsThe outcome shows that the solutions to overcome the existing Brazilian Port Authority governance problems remain in the Federal Government's hands by (1) removing its control through bureaucracy, (2) preventing the party-political influence following in the public ports and (3) decentralising port management by chief executive officers named by Port Authority Councils.Research limitations/implicationsThis paper does not explore the regulatory frameworks underlying the “Lease Terminal” and “Private User Terminal”.Originality/valueThis paper assesses the management models that led Brazilian's Port Authorities from 1993 to 2020, comparing them with the UK and Australian private service port and Antwerp landlord model.

Centralized and Decentralized Organizational Structure: The Impact on Employee Satisfaction and Performance

“…In another example, Brazilian shipping ports were re-organized by legislation in 1993 to decentralize, changing the previous structure of control and operation by the federal government, a centralized organization (Marques Soares, 2022). The measures in the attempt to decentralize the Brazilian ports were not implemented as intended.…”

“…In a survey conducted with stakeholders of Brazilian port partners, in nearly every category of questions concerning performance perception of different operating models, the public and decentralized form of governance was preferred by an overall score of 90%, followed by private and decentralized at 64%, and considered the least preferred perception of performance was that of public and centralized governance at 47% (Marques Soares, 2022). This study reflected in Table 1 reinforces the preference for autonomy to make decisions separate from a central authority, flexibility to manage daily operations in a decentralized way, and evidence that horizontal collaboration and growth is best enabled through allowing business units to manage the business as it makes sense in that specific economy and industry.…”