In 2020, profound changes have taken place in the international shipping industry, and a number of important shipping news events have appeared.
According to the statistics of all international news released in 2020, TJ China Freight evaluates the impact and practical significance of news events on the shipping industry according to the exposure and dissemination rate and selects the top 5 logistics news.
1. Crew change becomes a problem of the century, and all parties made active efforts
In 2020, the COVID-19 epidemic has made the shift of crew members a problem of the century, putting both physical and psychological pressure on crew members.
Dozens of industry organizations, including BIMCO, ICS and ITF, along with hundreds of shipping companies and ship management companies including Cosco Shipping, Maersk Line, V.ROUp and BESSer, have spoken out on behalf of the crew, listing them as "key practitioners" and actively calling for practical solutions for crew turnover.
After multiple appeals and effective cooperation within and outside the industry, China, Singapore and other countries and regions as well as their ports have gradually eased entry restrictions on seafarers and helped seafarers change shifts safely.
2. Cruise lines are struggling to recover and many cruise lines have gone bankrupt
In 2020, the cruise industry was hit bottom due to the epidemic, and the "Diamond Princess" cruise ship suffered a large-scale epidemic.
Companies such as Kobe Glows of Japan and Berman of Spain have declared bankruptcy, forcing a series of cancellations.
Royal Caribbean oil tankers, Carnival cruises and other ships have sold off their assets sharply, making it difficult for cruises to resume sailing.
3. Crude oil futures prices fell to negative for a while floating reserves dominate the tanker market
On April 20, the may contract price of WTI crude oil finally dropped to $37.63 after breaking through the $10, $5, $1 and $0 barrier successively, down by more than 300% and setting a record.
In early July, floating oil storage reached a record 307.3 million b/d.
Despite OPEC+ 's plan to cut output, several agencies believe a full recovery in oil demand will not take place until 2022. The outbreak will continue to affect the tanker market for many years to come, and changes in global refining capacity and crude production will have an impact on trade flows.
4. Trans-pacific/Asia-Europe freight rates hit 18-month high A new wave of shipbuilding boom has started
Freight rates on china-U.s. western coast routes rose in the second half of 2020, hitting their highest level since January 2019, as shipping market capacity dwindled and trade demand increased.
At the same time, the Asia-Europe line is also showing high freight rates, capacity tightening, demand skyrocketing.
As the supply and demand structure is unlikely to change materially in the short term, freight rates are expected to remain high at least until 2020, and possibly until 2021.
Drewry forecasts a $14 billion gain in 2020 for the consolidation sector.
As shipping companies' profits have risen, Companies such as Haberot and ONE have placed orders, making a 23,000TEU container ship the minimum threshold for new construction.
5. Beirut Harbour blast kills more than 4,000 people at least 14 ships affected
At about 2040 PM local time on August 4, a huge explosion occurred in a port warehouse area near the center of Beirut, Lebanon.
The country's health minister confirmed that at least 78 people were killed and nearly 4,000 injured.
The offices of shipping companies Maersk, CMA, Haberot and others in Beirut harbor were badly damaged, with at least 14 ships affected.
Frequent accidents of dangerous goods, port security issues once again triggered the attention and thinking of the industry.
No matter how it was like in 2020, we will welcome the arrival of a brand new year 2021!TJ China Freight and all our freight forwarders members may you and your families, friends have a healthy, happy and successful 2021!Thanks for having you all the way!
