From 4 to 6 October 2004 the European Transport Conference (http://www.aetransport.co.uk/etc_2004/) was held for the second time in Strasbourg, France. The European Transport Conference is the focus of the activities of the Association for European Transport and is the key annual event for European transport practitioners and researchers. The conference is a 'meeting of minds', where transport professionals come together to keep up-to-date with policy issues, research findings and best practice across a broad spectrum of transport.

At this esteemed conference Prof. Dr. Eddy Van de Voorde, Vice-Chairman of ITMMA's Executive Board, chaired three of the nine sessions within the freight and logistics seminar:

• Session 7: Decoupling Freight - or not?
• Session 8: A supply chain perspective on freight
• Session 9: Maritime and ports

Within session 9 of the Freight and Logistics seminar Mr. Filip Merckx, Research Associate at the University of Antwerp - ITMMA, presented the paper 'Freight integration in liner shipping'. This paper (jointly written with Prof. Dr. Theo Notteboom, Associate Professor at ITMMA) aims to critically assess carriers' strategies in view of optimising inland transportation in the context of freight integration and provides a bird's eye analysis on the involvement of shipping lines in all segments of the logistics chain.