OTAL, MOL Announce New Liners Services

French shipping group, OT  Africa Line has announced the launching of a new weekly service between the West African port of Cotonou in Benin and Europe by way of transhipping at Tangier.
Transhipment into Europe will be available at Tangier for containers, reefer and hazardous cargo shipments. The service will link at the North African port with OT Africa’s current EPIC service which calls at Southampton, Rotterdam, Hamburg, Antwerp and Le Havre, and the company’s DIAMS service in the Mediterranean calling at Barcelona, Marseille and Valencia.
Japan’s Mitsui OSK Lines (MOL) has also announced the restructuring of its Asia – West Africa service with a new mainline service and two feeder services.
MOL will change the current Asia – West Africa service from the West Africa Super Express service (WA1) to a New Asia – West Africa service via Suez using a new Europe / West Africa feeder service. At the same time, MOL will introduce a new service, the Indian Ocean Islands, South Africa, West Africa dedicated container service (ISW), which is aimed at improving Asia – IOI and South Africa – West Africa trades.
For the Asia – West Africa trade via Suez, MOL will have two feeder loops between Europe and West Africa, one of which is dedicated for Lagos, which suffers heavy port congestion. The other feeder service will cover Dakar (Senegal) and Cotonou (Benin), two new West African ports of call. MOL will use the China / Europe service (SCX) as the trunk line connecting to the Europe / Lagos feeder (North loop) via Zeebrugge (Belgium). For the Europe / West Africa feeder (South loop), MOL will use the Japan / China / Europe service (JEX) as the trunk line connecting at Tangier (Morocco).