Indeed, the importance of Belfast Port to Ireland can be seen purely in terms of passenger numbers, where, with about 1.3m passengers last year, Belfast was the busiest passenger port on the island.

But it is also strong across practically all trade sectors, handling about 17 million tonnes of goods last year. It is the largest breakbulk port in Ireland (timber, steel, etc), and paper products jumped by 73% to over 100,000 tonnes.

And while passenger numbers have been down from their peak at the turn of this century (in keeping with global trends), roll-on roll-off freight traffic remained strong at almost 350,000 vehicles.

This experience with freight places Belfast in an ideal position to provide a solution to the expected deficit in the Republic of Ireland's RoRo and LoLo (Lift on- Lift off) capacity. The port already has a 200m investment strategy which covers the next four years.

"We feel that we can respond better and faster than other ports in Ireland, " said Joe O'Neill, commercial director with Belfast Port. "There a five things that you need for port development. You need land. You need deep water.

You need a favourable planning regime. You need the cash reserves. And you need the managerial experience. In Belfast, we have two significant land banks of about 100 acres, we have the planning regime, we have the cash reserves to begin immediately without having to borrow, and, thanks to our development programme over recent years, we have the management experience in the development of both RoRo and LoLo capacity."