The Eligibility of Busan Port as A Hub Port in North East Asia

Many countries in the North East Asia are competing with each other in order to become a centre of international logistics activities. The competition to become a hub port in Far East region is now fierce. The anticipated investments on improving port facilities and attracting the mega carriers are immense for all the ports in the region and the extent of the effort could cripple the local ports and region's economy given the limited financial resources. It is, however, impossible to avoid the disastrous possibility that the massive investments could be channeled into the port, which will never become a hub port, as no port is ready to currently admit defeat and settle as a small regional port. In an attempt to minimise such disastrous waste of resources, ports need to verify the eligibility of their own. This paper tests a system dynamics model using the Port of Busan to understand and illustrate the principle guideline of investment decision making for ports.