Verified Gross Mass rule to increase costs of LA-Shanghai box 14pc

PostTime:2016-03-23 08:03:47 View:412

A NEW report says the time and money needed verify the weight of all containers stands to increase costs for shipping a container from Los Angeles to Shanghai by 14pc, reports the Wall Street Journal. New York research consultancy Cowen and Co said costs would increase because of the extra time and expense that shipping lines and their customers face.  Those costs may include fees for weighing shipping containers and charges for holding goods while information on the goods is collected and verified. The report said apparel importers face the biggest impact when the rule takes effect July 1 since they will be moving new clothing lines to stores for the fall.  Many of those importers may start shipping clothing by air freight, which is far more expensive than ocean freight to get around potential bottlenecks, the Cowen report said. "Extended shipping times could result in greater air freight usage for key back-to-school deliveries," the report said. "And potential inventory markdown or cancelled orders will come from delaying shipments." The requirement come from the UN's International Maritime Organisation (IMO). It requires shippers to provide "verified gross mass," or weight of all containers and any filler material before they are loaded on to ships. Today, only an estimate is required for loading. That has led to improperly loaded containers, regulators say, including collapsing container stacks. Although the weighing is seemingly simple for any one container, the requirement adds a new wrinkle to logistics operation, adding daunting and expensive complications across shipping networks. The Ocean Carrier Equipment Management Association, which represent carriers, released its own analysis and said container should not be loaded if shippers haven't submitted the verified weight information to carriers. Shipping intermediaries such a freight forwarders stand to benefit from the new rule, the Cowen report said, as shippers will likely call on them to help manage the changes. But none of the solutions have addressed shippers' concern about costs.

Shanghai fell 25.4pc in February to 2.41 million TEU, Singapore off 7.7pc

PostTime:2016-03-17 08:31:24 View:450

SINGAPORE's Maritime and Port Authority reported a 7.7 per cent decrease in container movement in February, having handled 2.41 million TEU compared to 2.61 million TEU in February last year. Shanghai port volume fell 25.4pc in February 2.59 TEU, slightly higher than 2.57 TEU in the same month last year. Tonnage figures from the Hong Kong Marine Department to be posted on the March 18.

HK down by 9.6pc to 1.64 million TEU, Singapore off 10pc, Shanghai off 7pc

PostTime:2016-03-03 08:12:41 View:493

FIGURES from the Hong Kong Port Development Council showed the port handled 1.64 million TEU in January, representing a year-on-year decrease of 9.6 per cent from 1.82 million TEU in January last year. Ordinarily the Hong Kong Marine Department releases the monthly port statistics on or about the 16th of every month, but this did not happen in February. Repeated enquiries by telephone and email produced little response other than one man saying the person who usually did this job was away for the day, and then a woman, the next day, said, the person was still away. Yet another call, had Hong Kong Shipping Gazette directed to the Hong Kong Port Development Council website to get the updates January tonnages statistics. At the recent annual Anglo-Eastern press luncheon, the company's executive chairman Peter Cremers said in response to the perennial question about which city - Hong Kong or Singapore - was best for shipping, said that while Singapore was too expensive, problems dealing with the Hong Kong Marine Department eliminated any advantage Hong Kong might have had. "I think the problem with the marine department started with the Lamma ferry disaster [in 2012}. The marine department has never been the same since," he said. Singapore's Maritime and Port Authority reported a 10.4pc decrease in container movement in January, having handled 2.49 million TEU compared to 2.78 million TEU in January last year. The Shanghai International Port (Group) Co (SIPG) posted a seven per cent drop in year-on-year container volume to 2.94 million TEU. Shanghai port again retained its title as the worlds No 1 container port with an annual box volume of 36.54 million TEU, up 3.5 per cent year on year. Shanghai beat its closest rival Singapore, which posted volumes of 30.9 million TEU in 2015, down 8.7 per cent year on year. Meanwhile, Hong Kong fell 9.5pc in 2015 to 20.1 million TEU.

Shanghai still top box port, up 3.5pc to 36.54 million TEU, but profit off 4pc

PostTime:2016-01-13 08:04:52 View:455

THE Port of Shanghai has posted a 3.5 per cent year-on-year increase in 2015 container volume to 36.54 million TEU, again claiming the title as the world's busiest box port. While Singapore has not posted its 2015 throughput, it has reported volumes of 28.41 million TEU for the first 11 months, making it unlikely, if not impossible, to beat Shanghai. Thus, Shanghai International Port (Group) Co (SIPG) has retained the number one spot. In December, Shanghai moved 3.07 million TEU, a year-on-year increase of 5.9 per cent. SIPG also posted a four per cent year on year net profit of decline of CNY6.5 billion (US$988.7 million) in 2015, against a profit of CNY6.77 billion the year before. But revenue was up 2.5 per cent year on year to CNY29.5 billion.

NYK Automotive Logistics opens new vehicle processing centre in Shanghai

PostTime:2015-12-23 08:20:38 View:447

NYK Automotive Logistics (China) Co (NALC), a wholly-owned NYK Group unit that handles 4.5 million cars annually, has established a new vehicle processing centre that will be managed by NYK Vehicle Processing Service (Shanghai) Co (NVPC), a joint venture between NALC and Taiwan-based Tonglit Logistics Co.  The new centre will provide customers with value-added services that are in high demand in China's finished vehicle logistics market, where continual economic growth is expected, a company statement said. Located two kilometres from a dedicated terminal for automobiles in Shanghai, it will provide not only conventional services like storage, customs clearance, and pre-delivery inspection services for the repair and supply of parts for finished vehicles, but sheeting, painting and repairs. To reduce the centres environmental impact, solar panels are being installed on the roof and an automatic water-recycling device will filter and sterilise water used for car washes.    

Courage Marine to close Taiwan, Shanghai

PostTime:2015-12-07 08:25:52 View:372

Courage Marine is taking further steps to streamline its operations and cut costs as it tries to survive the prolonged downturn in the dry bulk market. The group has already divested some of its poorer performing assets and now is restructuring by closing down some overseas operations and offices in Taiwan and Shanghai, it said in a stock market announcement. Courage Marine has divested two subsidiaries in Panama and one in Taiwan, all involved in handling agency and other ancillary services for the group. The company will now use third party providers instead.Its operations and office in Taiwan and the representative office in Shanghai will also be closed down and Courage Marine will focus its efforts on operating out of its main base in Hong Kong. "After the closure of the offices, the company will centralise its operations in Hong Kong. Such decision and course of action are in line with the intention of the board to restructure/streamline the operations and business of the group and would reduce the group’s operating costs and expenses to a considerable extent," Courage Marine said.

Shanghai Port Struggles in Quest to Become Global Shipping Leader

PostTime:2015-11-18 08:17:33 View:506

 Five years after it passed Singapore to become the world’s largest container port by throughput, Shanghai is finding it a struggle to become a leader in shipping services too. China’s financial capital still lags behind Singapore, London, Hong Kong, Rotterdam and Hamburg for overall port conditions and maritime services, according to an annual ranking conducted by China’s Xinhua News Agency and the Baltic Exchange, a provider of information on shipping markets. Zhen Hong, secretary general of the Shanghai International Shipping Institute, said the goal is for Shanghai to become a global shipping leader within the next five years. Declining trade — Chinese exports have fallen for four straight months, while imports are in a year-long slump — will slow the port’s growth but won’t stop it, he said. “We may not reach the target with flying colors,” Zhen said in a Nov. 9 interview, “but we’ll be able to basically achieve it.” Largest Port In 2009, China announced a plan to establish an international shipping center by 2020 with “capabilities to allocate global shipping resources.” Shanghai received a boost when the central government made it the site of the first national-level free-trade zone, a place to test policies such as greater capital-account convertibility and cross-border yuan settlement and financing. The rapid growth of the Chinese economy helped drive up Shanghai’s throughput numbers. But size isn’t everything when it comes to shipping services. “Just by handling the largest volume in the world doesn’t necessarily make it the best place from the shipping companies’ perspective,” Parash Jain, a Hong Kong-based shipping analyst at HSBC Securities Asia Ltd., said in a phone interview. “On maritime services, Shanghai has miles to cover in terms of ship registration, shipping brokerage, ship management, financing and bunkering.” Key to this would be developing shipping services such as insurance, maritime arbitrage and ship financing, Zhen and Jain both said. High financing costs in China are hampering the development of industries such as ship financing and insurance, Jain said. London Calling London, which served as the center of Britain’s maritime empire, remains the global leader in shipping services. It currently controls a third of the world’s shipping insurance market and handles the lion’s share of maritime dispute arbitration, according to Maritime London, a non-profit industry group. The London Maritime Arbitrators Association received almost 3,000 cases in 2013, while Shanghai handles a few hundred a year, Zhen said. “We can’t catch up” with London in five years, Zhen said. “Our aim is to have a notable increase in high-end shipping services.” Zhen is confident Shanghai can maintain its lead in container volume over Singapore. Last year Shanghai had 35.2 million twenty-foot equivalent units, or TEUs, of container traffic, compared with 33.9 million for Singapore. Rounding out the top five global ports were Shenzhen, Hong Kong and Ningbo, all part of China. Zhen said Singapore should handle about 40 million TEUs of cargo five years from now. He declined to give a forecast for Shanghai’s throughput in 2020, but said the institute has set a target of 50 million TEUs for 2030. Free-Trade Boost Singapore is taking steps to boost its profile, including relocating port operations to a site with 65 million TEUs of capacity, a move that should be complete by 2023. Shanghai is expanding its main deepwater port of Yangshan, but won’t immediately be able to match Singapore’s augmented capacity, Jain said. One advantage could be Shanghai’s free-trade zone, which opened in 2013. The government has relaxed cabotage rights there and implemented new investment rules, some of which have also been extended to free-trade zones in Tianjin, Fujian and Guangdong that opened this year. The Shanghai zone also pioneered a series of streamlined customs and bonding procedures. Most popular among the policies is one that lets foreign shipping companies operate wholly owned ship-management companies, Zhen said. So far about 10 companies have set up management companies in the Shanghai zone, he said. The Shanghai zone also is testing a policy that allows foreigners full ownership of shipping companies, according to Zhang Jieshu, the shipping institute’s deputy party secretary. “Ship owners might have more confidence in foreign management companies as they are better organized and have experience,” Zhen said. “This represents a market opportunity for foreign companies and doesn’t require a lot of capital.”

Shanghai Port registers first quarterly profit fall in over a year

PostTime:2015-11-02 08:39:26 View:295

THE operator of the world's busiest container port, Shanghai International Port Group Co Ltd, has posted a third quarter net profit of CNY1.4 billion (US$220.29 million), down 18.3 per cent from the same period a year earlier. Its the first fall in quarterly net profit in over a year, providing evidence of China's economic slowdown, the port said in a filing to the Shanghai Stock Exchange, according to Reuters. China, the world's second largest economy, grew 6.9 per cent in the third quarter, dipping below 7 per cent for the first time since the global financial crisis due to cooling trade and investments. The third quarter net profit fall marked the first decline since the second quarter of 2014, Eikon data based on company data showed. In the first nine months, Shanghai Port's net profit dropped 3.3 per cent to CNY4.5 billion. The port's container throughput rose 4.5 per cent to 35.29 million TEU in 2014, putting it ahead of global rivals such as Singapore and South Korea's Busan, as well as Shenzhen and Tianjin in China. Smaller listed rivals across China saw similar trends in their financial results this week. Tianjin Port Holdings Co Ltd was one of the few that bucked the trend by reporting a rise in third-quarter net profit, though this was a modest 6 per cent.

Expanded Shanghai Yangshan terminal to operate automotive intelligent vehicles

PostTime:2015-10-30 08:23:12 View:356

THE container terminal operator of Shanghai's deep water port, Yangshan Container Terminal, has short-listed four firms to supply 50 automotive intelligent vehicles (AIVs) and related equipment and services for its Phase 4 Terminal project. One of the firms to be selected is France's Gaussin whose offer, valued at US$69 million, makes provision to deliver the first ten AIVs in February 2016, two months ahead of the scheduled delivery date, reported Lloyd's Loading List. The current order is expected to be followed by a new tender from Yangshan Container Terminal for the supply of a further 80 fully-automated AIVs, taking its 'automated' fleet to 130 vehicles. When the Yangshan Phase 4 Terminal project was first announced in 2014, local media reports quoted the port authority, the Shanghai International Port Group (SIPG), as saying that the deep-water port's capacity would rise by 40 per cent, or by four million TEU annually, with the construction of seven additional berths for vessels. Scheduled for completion in 2017, investment costs were estimated at between $1.6 billion and $1.8 billion. However, two years on, it is unclear whether the initial size and scope of the project and the projected financial outlay have been retained.

Wärtsilä CSSC jv breaks ground on Shanghai factory

PostTime:2015-10-30 08:17:33 View:417

A joint venture between Wärtsilä Engine and CSSC, known as CSSC Wärtsilä Engine (Shanghai) Co. Ltd (CWEC), has begun the ground-breaking process for its 20,000 sq m engine factory in Shanghai, China. The factory will produce the Wärtsilä 26, Wärtsilä 32, Wärtsilä 34DF, and Wärtsilä 46F engines, with a planned capacity of 180 engines per year, mainly targeting China’s growing offshore and LNG segements. The first engines will be ready for delivery in 2016. Speaking at a CWEC ground-breaking ceremony yesterday, Wu Qiang, CSSC president, said: "This is an important occasion for the shipping industry in China. The new factory will produce state-of-the-art marine engines that will serve our customers with value adding efficiencies. We are pleased to cooperate with Wärtsilä in this exciting joint venture.” "It is an honour and a privilege to celebrate this latest milestone in our joint venture journey,” said Roger Holm, senior vp, Engines, Wärtsilä Marine Solutions. “By combining the strengths of our two companies - CSSC's strong capabilities as the number one ship builder in China and Wärtsilä's industry leading technologies, we can together make an important difference in today's challenging global marine market.”

Shanghai to see 135 LNG-fueled inland vessels by 2017

PostTime:2015-09-23 08:24:19 View:869

China’s progressive drive to curb emissions from ships will see the use of 135 LNG-powered inland river vessels plying the Shanghai River by 2017, according to Shanghai Municipal Transport Commission. Zhang Lin, deputy director of Shanghai Municipal Transport Commission, told reporters that the authorities are pushing ahead with plans to introduce more inland LNG-fueled vessels, increasing from the current 35 that are in operation. “The plan is to deploy an additional 100 more LNG-fueled vessels onto Shanghai River within the next two years to meet growing demand,” Zhang said at last week’s Marintec China 2015 press conference held in Shanghai. The introduction of more LNG-powered vessels is in line with a 2015-2020 action plan announced by China’s ministry of transport on 31 August, under which China will establish emission control areas for ships and other waterborne vessels. The plan has spelled out targets for ships and port pollution prevention and control, covering coastal and inland river ports and docks, and at shipyards. Ships will be required to meet the standards by 2020, and those that failed the standards by the deadline will be made obsolete over time. For Chinese shipbuilders, this points to growing demand for environmentally-friendly vessels. Marintec China, to be held from 1-4 December 2015 in Shanghai, will feature innovation and green technology as a key forum theme, tying in with China’s strategy to promote technological innovation in its shipbuilding industry.

Shanghai gains insights into Dubai's maritime strategy

PostTime:2015-09-18 08:13:56 View:636

Dubai and Shanghai have been sharing experiences on their development as top maritime centres. Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem, chairman of Dubai Ports, Customs and Free Zone Corporation and president of Dubai Maritime City Authority (DMCA), received Judge Zhao Hong, president of Shanghai Maritime Court,along with a delegation of senior officials from various Chinese legal institutions at the Emirates Towers in Dubai. The delegates gained insights on the Dubai Maritime Sector Strategy (MSS) and the latest marine initiatives undertaken by the emirate to boost various aspects of the maritime sector in terms of operational initiatives and maritime arbitration launched recently. The visiting delegation was accompanied by Michael Hwang, Chief Justice of the Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC) Courts. Bin Sulayem said: “Hosting a high-level delegation from the Shanghai Maritime Courts comes as part of DMCA’s efforts to promote the exchange of relevant best experiences and practices related to the maritime sector. It will also help in establishing stronger bilateral maritime relations between Dubai and Shanghai, as both cities are considered among the most important international maritime clusters. “Moreover, the meeting allowed us to highlight the vital role played by the DMCA in terms of improving the performance, efficiency and competitiveness of Dubai’s maritime sector through the launch of ambitious initiatives such as the MSS and the Emirates Maritime Arbitration Centre (EMAC). These have had a larger impact in advancing the local maritime sector to be among the world’s most developed, positioning Dubai as one of the leading maritime centres in the world in the next five years,” Bin Sulayem concluded. MSS drew high interest from the visitors who expressed their admiration for its positive effects, especially in terms of strengthening the confidence of regional and international investors in the competitive advantages of the local maritime sector. Furthermore, DMCA elaborated on its best practices in international arbitration and the working mechanism of the EMAC, which is of strategic importance as the first centre of its kind in the Middle East to provide maritime arbitration services for the settlement of marine disputes. The authority also emphasized the significance of specialized maritime arbitration in the UAE. The delegates were informed about legal frameworks and legislations related to maritime arbitration as well as provisions and regulations of the EMAC and its mechanisms at the local, regional and international levels. DMCA officials emphasized the need for an integrated framework to resolve disputes arising from marine commercial transactions to develop a maritime environment that is able to keep up with rapid developments and emerging trends. At the end of the session, both parties exchanged traditional gifts and emphasized their shared commitment to strengthen the bridges of effective communication to serve their common aspirations.