Netherlands Port Infrastructure is World's Best

The Port of Rotterdam is Europe's busiest port by far.

The Netherlands ranked first in the world for port infrastructure in a report by the World Economic Forum, switching places with Singapore, which is now second.

"The Global Competitiveness Report 2012-2013" rounds out the top ten with Hong Kong, Panama, the United Arab Emirates, Belgium, Finland, Iceland, Germany and Bahrain.

The Port of Rotterdam attributes the Netherlands' strong port infrastructure to investment projects in Rotterdam between 2000 and 2011, including the expansion of roadways and railroads, bridges, terminals and refineries.

The ports are judged on a scale of 1 to 7 based on a survey of business executives, and the Netherlands and Singapore both scored a 6.8.

On the other end of the scale, Haiti, and Bosnia and Herzegovina were the two lowest-scoring, non-landlocked nations, with scores of 1.9 and 1.7 respectively.

The Port of Rotterdam said it is continuing its infrastructure improvements, spending about €150 million ($193 million) a year on the maintenance and expansion of roads and quays as well as safety, environmental improvements and other changes, and it said the government is budgeting €1.5 billion ($1.9 billion) to improve a 45-kilometre motorway corridor from Maasvlakte to the hinterland.

The port handled 434.6 million tonnes of goods in 2011, making it by far the businesses port in Europe and the fifth busiest in the world, according to its official port statistics.

The report addressed the level of business competitiveness of different countries based on a variety of factors and put Switzerland, Singapore and Finland in the top three places overall.