Concentration And Distribution of Container Flows In Mauritania's Maritime System (2019-2022)

TL;DR

This study examines the structure of Mauritania's maritime container system from 2019 to 2022, revealing high route concentration, distinct import-export node patterns, and stable route structures over time.

Contribution

It provides empirical analysis of container flow concentration and distribution patterns in Mauritania's maritime system, highlighting structural properties and temporal stability.

Findings

Strong corridor concentration with top three routes accounting for 84% of FFE

Imports are highly concentrated in few destination nodes, exports originate from two main nodes

Route concentration remains stable over time, while node distributions vary notably

Abstract

Small, trade-dependent economies often exhibit limited maritime connectivity, yet empirical evidence on the structural configuration of their container systems remains limited. This study analyzes route concentration and node distributions in Mauritania's maritime container system during 2019-2022 using shipment-level data measured in forty-foot equivalent units (FFE). Routes, origin nodes, destination nodes, and industries are represented as FFE-weighted probability distributions, and concentration and divergence metrics are used to assess structural properties. The results show strong corridor concentration across the seven observed routes (HHI = 0.296), with the top three accounting for approximately 84% of total FFE. Node structures differ by direction: imports are associated with a highly concentrated set of destination nodes (HHI = 0.848), while exports originate from only two origin nodes (HHI = 0.567) and are distributed across a large number of destinations (HHI = 0.053). Industry distributions are more concentrated for exports (HHI = 0.352) than for imports (HHI = 0.096), with frozen fish and seafood accounting for more than 53% of export volume. Temporal analysis shows that route concentration remains stable over time (HHI ~ 0.293-0.303), while node distributions exhibit measurable variation, particularly for export destinations (JSD ~ 0.395) and import origins (JSD ~ 0.250).