Ports and regional development: A spatial analysis on a panel of European regions

•We analyse the impact of port activities on local development.•The paper focuses on 621 TL-3 European regions observed over the period 1998–2009.•We use spatial panel econometric framework to highlight spillover effects.•The model estimates direct and indirect effects associated to port activities.•We estimate the impact on GDP in port and non-port regions.

This paper analyses the impact of port activities on local development for a sample of 621 TL-3 regions located in thirteen European countries and observed over the period 1998–2009. Using a spatial panel econometric framework which controls for spatial fixed effects, the paper provides an estimate of both the direct and indirect (i.e. spillover) effects associated to port activities. Results suggest that ports might have non-negligible effects on local GDP: interestingly, an important share of the effects takes place outside the region where the port is located.