International ports

CMA CGM will begin a rebranded standalone India America Express string from Aug. 15, decoupling from the consortium it had with Hapag-Lloyd.

The present situation provides a strong competitive advantage for Asian regional carriers who can transit both the Gulf of Aden and the southern Red Sea without being attacked, writes analyst Lars Jensen.

Maersk seems to be leading the race to scale the supply chain for Bangladesh’s booming ready-made garment verticals, with the carrier opening a third weekly Bangladesh-China loop.

Shippers advancing orders for Asian imports to avoid supply chain disruption and mitigate longer voyages around southern Africa lifted container throughput at Europe’s two largest ports.

Spot booking prices from West India to the US East and West coasts have seen four- to five-fold gains in the last week or so, according to local freight forwarders.

Colombo in recent months has found itself suffering serious capacity issues — an opportunity the Indian government and the country’s port stakeholders are looking to take advantage of.

Forwarders cited two plausible factors for the price move — excess capacity pumped into the market and a moderation in cargo booking demand due to improved shipper inventory levels.

The opening of the first of three new container berths last week at the Tuas mega container terminal is part of a larger effort to shift operations away from the city center.

NVO sources who spoke with the Journal of Commerce noted that carriers active on the regional trade lane have pulled tonnage out of the short-haul market for redeployment to China-centric longer-distance services.

As the crisis in the Red Sea hits seven months with no end in sight, the container shipping market has reached a point where stakeholders need to seriously consider their plan B in case the current reality persists for several more years, writes Lars Jensen.

After seeking their own paths on the India-US East Coast trade, the carriers have put an end to their long-time slot-swapping on India-North Europe routes, industry sources told the Journal of Commerce.

Sources are reporting a “sold-out window” for spot bookings on most services connecting the two trade lanes through a large part of July.

Cargo flow is improving through Singapore and major Chinese ports, but India’s largest container gateway, Mundra, is straining under rising transshipment volumes, ocean carriers and forwarders say.

Local forwarders say the rate hikes are partly due to worsening delays at key ports in Brazil, with ongoing construction work closing part of Navegantes and vessel diversions from that port overwhelming other gateways.

Hapag-Lloyd will be withdrawing from the Indamex service it has operated in conjunction with CMA CGM for decades and will kick off a standalone loop on the route in early August.

Forwarder sources believe that the upcoming weeks could prove challenging for bookings to the US East Coast, given that ONE’s WIN service will have two blank sailings out of India in July.

Still, insurers said the difficulties have yet to materialize in a noticeable rise in claims for spoiled cold chain or perishable products.

Summer strikes have begun in Europe with a series of walkouts causing significant disruption across the main German and French container ports.

Large Indian industrial importers, relying heavily on China for input products, have complained that despite shelling out exorbitantly high freight rates, vessel space at load ports continues to be problematic.

Established long-haul carriers are also launching a raft of new services between Asia and the Americas to take advantage of the buoyant market.

The continuing rate softness comes as some carriers prepare to implement peak season surcharges ranging from $500 to $750 per container on Indian loads to the East Coast, mostly from June 15.

As a destination port, Barcelona is being used for transshipment beyond its capacity, something that has increased dwell times and slowed the turnaround of vessels.

The fourth edition of the Container Port Performance Index shows some changes in the annual list’s middle tier as ports improve and new entrants make their mark.

Spot rate quotes secured by forwarders from major carriers for sailings near the end of June are up between $500 to $600 per container on average from levels seen for the first half of the month.

Ports not designed for transshipment are being inundated with boxes, one of the knock-on effects of Suez Canal diversions that is contributing to a global capacity crunch, experts say.

Carriers and forwarders said the average berthing delay is three to five days at Southeast Asia’s leading container gateway, but HMM and ONE said they are experiencing more than that.

Singapore is a key intermediate point for Indian transshipment trade, especially out of the country’s East Coast corridor that has fewer direct mainline connections.

One reason for the hesitation of shippers to sign deals is believed to be the decline of spot rates amid the demand downturn on the trade, and there is an expectation that dynamic will continue to hold.

The current market situation — amid the Red Sea crisis, growing port congestion and a sudden rise in demand — is similar to the early parts of the pandemic, where insufficient capacity led to the largest rate increases the industry has ever seen, writes Lars Jensen.

Carriers and forwarders say intra-Asia volumes are growing as long-haul ocean carriers redeploy vessels and omit calls on regional trades to bolster mainline east-west services.

The Chinese liner has reached a deal to acquire slot space on the WIN vessels, which local forwarder sources said began with the San Diego Bridge due to have arrived in Nhava Sheva Port on May 19.

Longer transit times to Europe and North America as vessels continue to divert via the Cape of Good Hope to avoid the Red Sea region has delayed the return of empty containers to Asia, particularly China.

Local industry observers and carrier executives expect Asian import flows into India to remain buoyant, aided by growing demand for raw materials and semi-finished products needed to support domestic industrial production lines.

Record container traffic between Hamburg and the US combined with increasing imports from China to nudge throughput at Europe’s third-largest port back into the black.

Containers offloaded from ships calling at APM Terminal’s Maasvlakte II terminal can be palletized and in trucks “within hours,” thanks to a new cross-dock warehouse, according to the Maersk’s new head of northern Europe.

Poor schedule reliability, challenged by a container supply chain that has been stretched thin by diversions away from the Suez Canal, is causing spot rates from India to Europe to rebound.

Carrier attempts to mitigate the extended transit times of sailing around southern Africa by increasing the use of transshipment in the Mediterranean are being frustrated by growing port congestion.

ONE's West India-North America Express (WIN) service is set to debut at Nhava Sheva with a May 12 call from the ONE Modern.

The tie-up is part of a wider move by individual members of THE Alliance to broaden their respective networks and maintain alliance commitments without adding a replacement carrier to succeed Hapag-Lloyd.

The launch of the new services comes amid an investment boom by Chinese companies in Mexico as part of wider US nearshoring efforts that include Central and South America.