Container lines

Ocean shippers worry that the advent of ultra-large container ships on the trans-Pacific trade will extend transit times of their imports and lead to more problems in the pickup of containers at port terminals.

Maersk Line will increase rates on several trade routes, effective April 1.

Cosco Container Lines will increase rates for all refrigerated shipments on its trade from the Far East to the Red Sea and Persian Gulf by $500 per unit, effective March 15.

APL has announced several rate increases and bunker surcharges that will go into effect in March and April.

Cheng Lie Navigation will launch the RBC2 service, a direct service from central China to Cambodia and Thailand.

CMA CGM will increase rates in its trade from North Europe, Scandinavia and the Mediterranean to Australia, starting April 1.

CMA CGM’s intermodal and logistics service centers in Hamburg, Germany, and Antwerp, Belgium, have developed new dedicated refrigerated hubs in North Europe.

Maersk Line announced eight customer service targets that CEO Soren Skou said reflect customers’ needs for improvements in basic tasks ranging from accurate documentation to answering phone calls promptly.

Compañía Sud Americana de Vapores posted a net loss of $23.9 million in the fourth quarter of 2012.

Danaos reported a net loss of $116.5 million in the fourth quarter of 2012, dropping from a profit of $9.1 million in the fourth quarter of 2011.

Trans-Pacific ocean carriers and shippers are poring over economic data to figure out whether demand will increase enough to absorb all the new vessel capacity coming down the runways, or whether that new capacity will threaten the rate increases carriers propose.

U.S. steel imports in January totaled 2.58 million tons, rising 4.6 percent from 2.47 million tons in December 2012, according to the American Institute for International Steel.

Hapag-Lloyd has announced several rate increases that will take effect on April 1.

OOCL Belgium, a 225 meter (about 738 foot) container ship, has gotten stuck in heavy ice on the Strait of Belle Isle in eastern Canada on its way from Montreal to England, according to CBC News.

Hapag-Lloyd will increase rates for all cargo in its trade from intra-Latin America and Latin America to North America, effective April 1.

Focusing on the use of liquefied natural gas as a marine fuel, an “LNG Fuelled Vessels Working Group” has been established with support from the International Association of Ports and Harbors’ World Ports Climate Initiative.

Hamburg Süd will increase rates on all cargo on its trade from the west coast ports of the U.S. and Canada to the Mediterranean, effective April 1.

Starting April 1, OOCL will hike rates on all cargo on its trade from Southeast Asia to Australia by $200 per 20-foot-equivalent unit.

Drewry Supply Chain Advisors said the planned merger of the schedules of the Grand Alliance and the New World Alliance between Asia and the East Coast of North America in May is “most probably just the beginning of much greater integration, and its consequences should not be ignored.”

Liner companies are cooperating with retailers, manufacturers, mining companies and other customers to measure, evaluate, report and reduce carbon and health-risk emissions throughout the supply chain, beginning with the shipment of raw materials to the factory and culminating in the delivery of the finished product to the store shelves.

Denmark’s DFDS, northern Europe’s largest short sea shipping company, saw pre-tax profit fall 80 percent in 2012 from the previous year on flat freight volumes and overcapacity in its key markets.

Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, Somalia’s president, has granted an amnesty to hundreds of young Somali pirates to reduce the threat to shipping in the seas near the Horn of Africa, a senior regional official said...

The Japanese Shipowners’ Association is urging the Suez Canal Authority to rescind the toll increase scheduled to go into effect on May 1.

CMA CGM will add South Carolina’s Port of Charleston to its Pacific Express 3 service, providing an additional connection for the region’s shippers to ports across Asia.

Samudera Shipping reported a profit of $21.2 million for 2012, a decline of 23.8 percent from 27.8 million in 2011.

U.S. container trade with Asian countries reached nearly 17.8 million 20-foot-equivalent units in the first 11 months of 2012.

Analysts are hopeful that trade between Japan and China will improve gradually this year after a 2012 slump made far more painful by a territorial dispute over a group of islands in the East China Sea.

Pacific International Lines has been sentenced in U.S. federal court under the terms of a plea agreement that requires the Singapore-based container shipping company to pay $2.2 million in criminal penalties...

Maersk's introduction of the first of its colossal Triple E container ships later this year will set off a chain of events that will ripple throughout the shipping world, and especially in the trans-Pacific.

Industrial machinery is expected to be the top driver of U.S. export and import trade now and in the next decade, according to the latest HSBC Commercial Banking trade forecast.

Mediterranean Shipping Co. will increase rates on all cargo for the Cheetah service from any Asian port to South Africa, the Indian Ocean, Mozambique and East Africa, effective April.

Hamburg Süd will increase rates on all cargo on its trade from the Mediterranean to Mexico and the U.S. Gulf, starting April 1.

Eimskip has appointed Jan Felix Grossbruchhaus as senior manager in Germany, effective April 1.

The member lines of the Asia-West Africa Trade Agreement will increase rates on its Far East to West Africa westbound trade by $250 per 20-foot-equivalent unit, effective March 15.

Samskip has launched a new container shipping route for rural Iceland.

Brazilian firm Triunfo Participações e Investimentos reported container traffic in January was 49,414 20-foot-equivalent units, increasing 9.6 percent year-over-year from 45,102 TEUs.