The COVID-19 pandemic led to a labour shortage crisis at maritime ports. Therefore, stakeholders of this industry must have robust tools to maintain good performance indicators of productivity and competitiveness. One of the most critical issues is the labour force related to allocation, performance evaluation, and foreseeing/adapting to new requirements. Many authors have studied the characteristics, elements, trends, and factors crucial in its management. However, there needs to be a comprehensive understanding of this concern. Therefore, this paper aims to develop a systematic literature review on labour force management in the maritime ports to (1) understand the elements and factors that strongly relate to human management and (2) identify future research directions to address the impact of labour shortages. Research questions and keywords were used to search academic databases for peer-reviewed papers, articles, or books. The search, selection and quality assessment processes were performed using the PRISMA methodology. This resulted in 32 documents for review and categorised based on their contributions to the research questions and content. The main findings include factors in labour force management, challenges in optimisation, technology and automation use, methods for evaluating performance, and the impact of the regulatory framework. In addition, potential future research streams were proposed to guide further studies into the needs of this industry.

Port Community Systems and Single-Window approaches are important for improving competitiveness and reducing costs associated with logistics activities, mainly in seaports. In Colombia, the ports on the Caribbean Sea have great potential for development and a privileged geographical position, but the lack of information technologies makes them uncompetitive. This article illustrates the requirements and conditions to be met in order to develop a customized IT system to improve the operations of the Colombian. These requirements and conditions are related to variables like efficiency, flexibility and customer satisfaction, according to the type of customer that will be using the IT tool. The results were obtained from a Principal Component Analysis and Multivariate Factor Analysis. Additionally, the identification of these factors can allow a better design of the IT tool, based on the needs of the customers. Therefore, the ports can be more attractive and efficient in negotiating trade agreements and thus enhance the competitiveness of the region and country. The results show that a single window platform for port communities should customize their services based on the type of user, in this case, were analyzed two types: importers and exporters. The efforts related to the services offered to the importers should focus on the operation part of foreign trade activities. In contrast, exporters have a high affinity for variables related to decision-making that are focused on administration and document management. Futures studies can be made considering all the members of the port community to develop an IT tool that can improve the foreign trade activities in underdeveloped countries.

With the widespread use of electronic seals (e-seals), their traceability and security have attracted more and more attention. Moreover, the complexity of shipping operations and container handling justifies the use of technologies to ensure information security in the face of attacks. This work contributes a blockchain-based solution with a simulated prototype for improving electronic seals for containers on terminals in ports. An electronic seal was designed, and a blockchain prototype was constructed for a container data flow. The obtained results from the prototype were evaluated using performance tests. The security issues in the blockchain were also discussed from a strategic perspective based on game theory. Finally, the simulation concluded that the blockchain improves transaction efficiency. No studies were found that integrated blockchain technology with electronic seals. Therefore, this work intends to combine blockchain technology with e-seal to improve the security of transferred data due to its immutable nature.