Container Shipping News

Coastal transshipment at Indian ports has grown considerably since the relaxation of cabotage rules, but detractors argue that privately operated minor ports have reaped more of the benefits than their publicly run counterparts.

The Panama Canal Authority (ACP) announced the sixth reduction in its maximum draft this year for the Neopanamax locks on Gatun Lake as water levels continue to fall.

Container carriers will have to remove nearly every vessel from service for at least a week to transition to low-sulfur fuel as mandated by the IMO, but BCOs hope that carriers don't use this as a way to manipulate capacity during the peak season.

Container carriers are rejecting proposed mandatory vessel speed limits, saying the move set to be discussed at the International Maritime Organization (IMO) meeting later this month would undermine climate change goals for shipping.

The container carrier’s latest efforts to provide integrated, end-to-end logistics services is helping it to make inroads in the Indian cold chain market.

Pressure is mounting on shipping lines to cut emissions via mandatory average speed limits on vessels, but data suggests carriers have been slow-steaming ships in the east-west trades for years.

Already facing a low-sulfur fuel mandate in 2020, the shipping industry is just beginning to gauge how to decarbonize, with slower-steaming already being proposed.

Container carrier schedule reliability in the eastbound trans-Pacific has bounced back from record lows in early 2019 but still lags global on-time performance by quite a bit.

A rapidly approaching deadline for the implementation of early greenhouse gas emissions reduction measures has given way to the belief that only operational steps can do the trick with low- or zero-carbon propulsion methods still several years away.

BCOs concerned about variations among carrier low-sulfur fuel surcharges may be able to shift volumes to exploit volatility in bunker pricing.

Chinese state-owned Cosco Shipping is one of several Asian and European ocean carriers that are increasingly focused on providing customers with deeper logistics services that go beyond conventional ocean shipping strategies.

Low water surcharges on the inland waterways from service providers work on a steeply increasing scale.

The merged container operations of Japan's three largest ocean carriers got off to a dismal start as it launched operations in April 2018, which helped drag down revenue.

Container carriers are caught in a classic “prisoner’s dilemma.” If they all install scrubbers, none of them reap the benefits of cheap, plentiful high-sulfur fuel that would come from widespread adoption of low-sulfur fuel.

The US Maritime Administration has awarded $6.79 million in federal marine highway grants to container-on-barge projects in Louisiana and Virginia and a waterborne service that will move farm products between Long Island and Connecticut.

HMM’s new CEO is on a European tour that will focus on three key challenges: the future of its 2M Alliance relationship, winning customer trust, and gaining insight into the low-sulfur fuel mandate.

Container vessel on-time performance could degrade even further as carriers remove ships from service to install equipment that “scrubs” harmful sulfur particles from ship exhaust in lieu of burning low-sulfur fuel.

The World Trade Organization has downgraded its 2019 outlook for world trade growth to 2.6 percent from a 3 percent clip in 2018, and global manufacturing is weakening.

Maersk’s commitment to a fully decarbonized fleet by 2050 is ensuring that decarbonization will immediately come onto the container shipping industry’s agenda.

Four of the world’s largest shipping lines received clearance this week to begin developing data standards through a new association designed to help carriers to tap more quickly into outside digital innovation.

Container carriers have reportedly wrapped up annual contract negotiations with some of the largest US importers and are now turning their full attention to NVOs and smaller BCOs.

With draft restrictions already imposed in the waterway’s larger locks due to lack of rain, the Panama Canal Authority is working on plans for a third water reservoir that would help replenish the locks system during dry weather.

Jorge Luis Quijano, administrator and chief executive of the Panama Canal Authority, said shipping lines don’t like the uncertainty of what could happen if International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) continue to oppose automation

Retailers and analysts expect slowing import growth in 2019 as year-over-year comparisons become increasingly more difficult due to front-loading of cargo in 2018 in advance of planned import tariffs.

Maersk Group says that of a total $500 million worldwide disbursement target program for 2019, it plans to provide $200 million in finance to India-based businesses this year.

CMA CGM has big plans for the company’s logistics service offerings after bringing CEVA into the fold.

Container carriers and the shipper supply chains that depend on them are in for a rude awakening if European regulators repeal the block exemption for liner carrier consortia.

The effects of Chinese New Year have smoothed out westbound Asia-Europe container volume in early 2019, but long-term demand concerns remain.

Container carriers are increasing capacity to Vietnam as manufacturers shift production from China to Southeast Asia.

Carrier executives are increasingly confident they will have compensatory, floating low-sulfur fuel BAFs installed with their customers by the fourth quarter.

Carriers continue to report dismal schedule reliability on trans-Pacific trade routes, and although solutions exist, each comes with an inherent cost.

George Goldman, president of Zim USA, tells JOC.com the independent carrier will route the majority of its US cargo from Prince Rupert to Chicago, Memphis, and New Orleans.

Container lines with the financial muscle — or state backing — are forging ahead with strategies aimed at controlling a greater portion of the container supply chain.

A slowing US economy and huge front-loading of spring cargoes in late 2018 point to muted import growth in 2019.

The South Korean container carrier says its new CEO will “focus on a customer’s view on handling HMM’s current issues in order to lead managerial innovation and strengthen its sales competitiveness.”

Only when carriers start actually using low-sulfur fuel later this year will the demand -- and the price -- be established.

Although the final decision lies with the college of commissioners, a European Commission working group is examining the pros and cons of modifying the liner block exemption regulation, rather than renewing or repealing it.

The International Transport Forum is calling for more clarity in the EU liner shipper block exemption rules, just days after the World Shipping Council submitted a report in support of extending the exemption.

The seventh straight week of declining container spot rates and a 1 percent drop in US imports in January and February signal more blank sailings ahead in the eastbound trans-Pacific.

Growing demand for manufacturing and refrigerated agricultural exports coupled with infrastructure upgrades and pro-trade reforms have made India one of the “top trading destinations” globally, according to the world’s largest container carrier.