Fingers are being pointed at the government's inability or reluctance to stem the erosion of Hong Kong's premier port status, despite more than five years' notice of its future decline.

Questions are being asked about whether the port's private sector operators - which also own and manage most of the major ports in Shenzhen - were complicit in the decline, or at least whether they did enough to mitigate it.

Nevertheless, barring external shocks that could alter trade trends in Southeast Asia in the second half of the year, Singapore will become the world's busiest container port by year-end.

But is surrendering its seat at the top really something Hong Kong's trade community should worry about? The terminals' operators think not.

'Who has the highest throughput in the world is completely meaningless,' Erik Bogh Christensen, who in April retired as the head of Modern Terminals, told the Hong Kong Chamber of Commerce in the latest issue of its in-house monthly magazine.

'What is really important is who is No1 in the order of ... operational and economic efficiency.'

The terminal operators, however, are at the high-value end of the port's food chain in terms of skills and resources, and as such may be among the last to suffer from Hong Kong's flagging growth.

Michael Enright, Sun Hung Kai professor at the University of Hong Kong, said Hong Kong's maritime trade community as a whole should not be too concerned about the decline.

'Increasingly, Hong Kong-based companies operate in a greater Pearl River Delta maritime trade environment, not just a Hong Kong environment,' Professor Enright said. 'Maritime trade in the greater PRD, most of which is managed and served by Hong Kong or Hong Kong entities, is still growing rapidly.

'The people who should be concerned are those performing some of the lower value-added activities associated with the physical flow of goods into and out of Hong Kong itself.

'As a greater portion of the region's trade is handled by PRD ports, they will be under severe pressure. At the managerial and high value-added service end, there should be less concern.'

Despite the numbers, there is some doubt as to whether Hong Kong actually handled less cargo - or derived less economic benefit - from its port activities in the first half than Singapore.

There's an old adage that numbers don't lie. But taken at face value they can certainly deceive, as the official accounts of the interim volumes of containerised cargo at both ports illustrate.

The Lion City's cargo volumes, or throughput, during that period expanded 15.8 per cent to reach 11.38 million teu (20-ft equivalent units, an industry standard measurement).

Operators in Hong Kong handled 10.74 million teu, which appears to indicate Singapore's economy benefited from handling roughly 6 per cent more trade.

But due to the complex way the operators charge for what they handle - by quay-crane moves rather than by the box - the reality is probably the opposite.

It is widely accepted that boxes of transshipment cargo - goods relayed from one waterborne vessel to another - are counted at least twice at any port. In extreme cases, they can be counted up to four times.

A box barged down the Pearl River from Zhongshan to the River Trade Terminal in Tsuen Mun, for example, is counted once when moved on to the dock at the RTT. If it is consolidated on to a larger barge bound for transport to the main terminals at Kwai Chung, it would be counted twice more, on and off the barge.

The fourth count comes when it is transferred to the ocean-going vessel bound for the goods' final destination. One box therefore shows up four times on the sheets of the government and port statisticians.

According to Singapore's Port Operator, PSA Corp, 85 per cent of its cargo is transshipment; in Hong Kong, that proportion is about 60 per cent.

If it assumed each box of transshipment is counted twice, Hong Kong was the conduit for about 7.5 million individual boxes of cargo in the first half - roughly 12.7 per cent more than Singapore.

'My sense is Hong Kong still caters to more intrinsic manufactured trade. Its notional cargo volumes are higher,' said Peter Williamson, a research analyst for Macquarie Securities who has monitored port activity in both cities. 'Should Hong Kong care that Singapore has overtaken it? Probably not - the long-term competition for the top spot will come from China.'

Far from a pedantic numerical exercise, however, analysts and economists believe accounting for the different types of cargo is critical, because of their varying contributions to the local economies.

A $7.8 million report last year by consultants GHK on the future of Hong Kong port found that each tonne of containerised transshipment cargo generated a 'direct economic benefit' of $135 for the local community; for direct cargo, which also fills the coffers of firms in ancillary services such as trucking, insurance and banking, the contribution swelled to $193.

By that measure, and assuming an average weight of 50 tonnes per box at both ports, Singapore's greater interim trade volumes would have contributed about $3.7 billion less to its economy than the smaller volumes in Hong Kong.

Whichever port handled the most pure trade or received the greater economic boost, the pace of growth - 15.8 per cent for Singapore versus 1.3 per cent for Hong Kong - paints a picture of two ports going in different directions.

Unlike Hong Kong, Singapore's state-run port was able to reverse declining growth in 2002, by responding to competition from emerging ports in Malaysia, lowering tariffs and offering incentive packages to key customers.

Given the positive result from what was effectively state intervention, questions have been raised about whether there was a place for a similar approach in Hong Kong, particularly after 2000, when the threat from ports in Shenzhen became obvious.

The Economic Development and Labour Bureau did not respond to enquiries.

Jonathan Beard, GHK's director, said he was wary of generalisations when comparing the effectiveness of public-sector facilities with their private-sector counterparts.

'Public sector ports may have deeper pockets - that is, they may be able to throw more money at the problem, which can also mean taxpayers' money is wasted,' Dr Beard said. 'They may also be able to have greater control, more strings to their bow, for responding to threats. But they also tend to be less commercial and customer focused.'

The debates over which port handles more cargo and derives more benefit may become academic shortly. The PSA will add 15 new berths to its Pasir Panjang Terminal by 2011, three of which will be ready this year. Five more come on stream next year.

The expansion is expected to boost by 45 per cent the PSA's annual handling capacity in Singapore to 31 million teu and the state bean-counters have already committed to more than S$400 million (HK$1.88 billion) for new port equipment.

With growth in Hong Kong shuffling along in the low single digits, the momentum for new terminal development has lost steam. The government has grown silent on expansion since the chief executive said in his 2003 policy address that Container Terminal 10 definitely would be built.

The private sector has focused its non-security-related capital commitments at existing and emerging ports such as Dachan Bay, Zhuhai's Gaolan and Shenzhen's Yantian.

Shenzhen's rise has prompted the inevitable decline of profit margins at their main facilities in Kwai Chung. But, as they are firmly entrenched north of the border, it appears to be a compromise they can live with.

'There should be realistic expectations regarding future returns and performance [in Hong Kong],' Dr Beard said. 'It is inevitable that Hong Kong will be overtaken by Shanghai as the largest container port - ignore Singapore for the moment.

'It is also unlikely that Hong Kong port profitability will ever be as high as in the 1980s and 90s. I doubt that will be repeated anywhere.'