Port Tampa Bay held first ever Maritime Workforce Expo for local students

TAMPA, Fla. - Port Tampa Bay held its first ever Maritime Workforce Expo for local students on Wednesday. 

What we know:

Around 800 people attended the event, including middle and high school students from Hillsborough, Pinellas and Pasco counties. Local college students and adult continuing education students were at the event, too. 

Students chatted with engineering, construction, shipping and maritime companies who work with the port about career opportunities, including jobs that may not require a college degree. 

"It’s really about jobs. The turnout is spectacular," Port Tampa Bay CEO and President Paul Anderson said of the event. "Port Tampa Bay is the largest single economic engine in West Central Florida related to job creation. And this is also about succession, replacing the graying of the workforce and getting these students excited about the opportunities in our industry."

What they're saying:

Students learned about a wide range of job opportunities, including pilots who help dock ships, crane operators and forklift drivers who offload cargo from ships, and welders who work on ship repairs. 

"They just opened the doors for me completely," Tevin Brown, a senior at Tampa Bay Technical High School, told FOX 13. "They showed me things that, like I said, I don't usually see. And so, it really gets my mind moving."

"Right now, I'm just scouting around, trying to see my options for what I plan to do after high school," fellow Tampa Bay Tech senior Joshua Chong added. 

By the numbers:

The port supports 192,201 maritime-related jobs with an average salary of $74,350. And workers at the port were busy last year. 

"We had records of pretty much everything we did at the port: number of containers, number of automobiles, record petroleum, number of cruise passengers," Anderson said. 

The port generates $1.2 billion in annual local and state tax revenue. 

According to Port Tampa Bay’s Year in Review (FY 2025) report released in December, the port plans to add two more ship-to-shore cranes this year. It also added a new terminal gate complex to the container terminal. The goal is to accommodate multiple large container ships simultaneously, boosting capacity. 

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New stats show some of the port’s leading commodities are petroleum, cement, and juice. 

"The Florida juice industry, the citrus industry, has faced massive declines because of hurricanes, blight, disease," Anderson added. "So, juice is a big import."

Nearly a quarter of Port Tampa Bay’s operating revenue is from cruises. They are expecting more than 1.7 million cruise guests this year.

"The revenue that the port earns from business – all-time record, (up) by 15% year over last year," Anderson said. "It all means that we have a very bright future for all of our kids in all these schools."