Global economic, social and cultural trends in many coastal areas of South Baltic resulted in decrease in their economic strength and ultimately their peripheralization. Traditional activities such as local fishery and processing, agriculture, local industry have lost their importance. On the other hand, there are many new potential areas of economic activity: new production and cooperation methods, diverse tourism, sailing, water sports, environmentally-friendly fishery, mariculture and off-shore industry. Local ports may and often are regional development centres for coastal economies. However, it requires several conditions to be met and appropriate actions to be taken. This project aim is to elaborate various development oppotunities facing local ports nowadays.