The barge transportation market is projected to expand at a significant pace during the forthcoming time period due to increasing petroleum exploration activities globally as well as increasing import and export agreements among countries.

A barge is generally a type of vessel which is used for transporting of cargo or ships’ stores or other general utility purposes. It is a shallow-draft, flat-bed vessel like the raft. The reason behind the type of shape is to make sure that the carrying capacity of cargo is high where more amount of bulk could be hauled and transferred.

Transport barges are referred as cargo-carrying crafts that are usually pushed or pulled by a strong vessel on ocean and inland waters. Barges are a type of hull which are essential assets as supporting units, lighters, lifting or pulling platforms. It is noted that several barge configurations are used by military and commercial interests.

The barge transportation has several benefits associated with it. These use less amount of fuel in order to move goods as compared to other methods of transporting, thus causing less air pollution. Additionally, the noise made by barges and the visual intrusion of these barges is less as compared to the other modes of transportation. It is considered to be the most common means for transporting mechanically dredged material.

Barge transportation market is segmented in terms of product, barge fleet, application, and regional landscape.

Based on product, the barge transportation market is classified into dry cargo, gaseous cargo, and liquid cargo. The liquid cargo segment will record a CAGR of over 4% from 2020 - 2026 due to the increasing investments in offshore drilling activities.

With respect to barge fleet, the barge transportation market is categorized into open, tank, and covered. The tank barge fleet segment held a market share of over 25% in 2019 owing to the rising demand from oil & gas industry.

In terms of application, the overall barge transportation market is bifurcated into metal ores; chemicals, rubber and plastic, nuclear fuel; agricultural products; food products, beverages, and tobacco; coke and refined petroleum products; basic metals, fabricated metal products; coal and crude petroleum; secondary raw materials and wastes; and others.

Among these, the coke & refined petroleum products segment is likely to register a CAGR of over 4% from 2020 - 2026 due to the increasing petroleum exploration across the globe.

From a regional frame of reference, the rising trade activities of the U.S. is creating the demand for this efficient transportation mode in the North America region.