Posted on November 10, 2025
In the UK, along the south of England, Shoreham Port was honoured with the European Sea Ports Organisation (ESPO) Award 2025 during a ceremony held in the Belgian capital.
The port in West Sussex won the ESPO Award for its strong commitment to fostering a supportive and inclusive work environment for women, thereby promoting greater gender balance within the port sector.
MEP Oihane Agirregoitia reached out for the award during a particularly festive edition of the ceremony. This year’s gala dinner took place at the Hôtel des Douanes in Brussels, bringing together around 200 guests.
Looking back at the selection process in this 17th edition of the ESPO Award, the Chairman of the Jury, Eamonn O’Reilly, said, “The ESPO Award brought forward six very different projects from ports in six different countries trying to tackle the challenge of deep-seated gender imbalance in our industry. As ports become ever more complex, we need to attract talent from the widest possible pool. Correcting gender imbalance and, more generally, breaking down other diversity barriers is not only in the best interest of ports, itis also the right thing to do. Europe’s values and the needs of ports are in complete alignment.”
The Board Chair of Shoreham Port, Catherine May, has emphasized that “It is a real honor for a port of our scale to benchmark with the inspirational diversity work taking place at some of Europe’s leading maritime hubs. We are delighted that our cultural transformation at Shoreham Port has won this year’s ESPO Award. Five years into our program, we’ve delivered huge change for working women across our port and community, and this recognition will inspire us to be even bolder as we enter the second half of our 10-year plan.”
Shoreham Port won the ESPO Award 2025 for its project “Diversity & Inclusion Strategy.” The strategy, launched in 2020, has transformed the organization by embedding inclusive values into its culture, governance, and business planning. With women now making up 50% of the executive team and 55% of the board, the port has become a national example of inclusive leadership. Initiatives such as flexible working, menopause awareness, and female-specific PPE have supported women’s development, while diversity-driven decision-making has boosted revenue by 52% since 2020. As the first UK port to achieve Women in Maritime Charter status and a founding member of the Diversity in Maritime Taskforce, Shoreham Port is setting a new standard for equality and success in the maritime industry.
Out of the six submissions received this year, the projects of the Port of Helsinki (Finland), the Port of Rotterdam (The Netherlands), the Port of Lisbon (Portugal), and Shoreham Port (United Kingdom) had been shortlisted for this 17th edition. All submissions are summarized in the ESPO Award Brochure 2025.
Also this week, on 5 November, ESPO published its Annual Report 2024-2025, which outlines the activities of the organization over the past year and the report can be downloaded here.
