Newly appointed Federal Maritime Commission Chairman Mario Cordero has provided a snapshot of the US container trades in a presentation to Congress on the Washington-based regulator’s 2014 budget.
He told a transport and infrastructure subcommittee that the transpacific continued to be the largest of the US container trades last year and China the leading overseas trading partner.
Newly appointed Federal Maritime Commission Chairman Mario Cordero has provided a snapshot of the US container trades in a presentation to Congress on the Washington-based regulator’s 2014 budget.
He told a transport and infrastructure subcommittee that the transpacific continued to be the largest of the US container trades last year and China the leading overseas trading partner.
Cordero, who took over from Richard Lidinksy on 1 April, told the House of Representatives: “The [2012] volume in the transpacific trade exceeded 19 million teu. Trade with nations in Asia continued to account for almost 62% of US containerised imports and exports.
“Furthermore, in March 2012, the US entered into a free trade agreement with South Korea, our third-largest liner trading partner in the region after China and Japan.”
Last year, total transpacific container trade grew by less than 1%, said Cordero.
He said: “Container import growth remained anaemic, increasing by less than 1% for the second year in a row. Container exports slowed in 2012, increasing by just over 1%, compared with a 7% increase in 2011.
“As usual, imports from Asia dominated the transpacific trade; for every container exported to Asia from the US, just over two were imported.”
Cordero said, in a wide-ranging presentation, that the international container industry’s “slow recovery” appeared to be impacting carriers’ vessel deployment decisions.
“The amount of containership capacity lying idle at the beginning of this calendar year was 809,000teu, or 5% of the total worldwide fleet capacity of 16.3 million teu,” he said.
“This is an increase compared with the same time last year, when 595,000teu were idle, or 4% of the total worldwide fleet capacity of 15.4 million teu.”
The FMC boss continued: “In terms of orders for new vessels, at the beginning of this calendar year, 3.4 million teu of containership capacity was on the orderbooks, equivalent to 21% of the existing fleet capacity of 16.3 million teu.
“At the same time last year, 4.3 million teu was on order, equivalent to 28% of the then-existing fleet capacity of 15.4 million teu.”
He concluded: “Concentration in the liner industry dipped slightly last year. In 2012, the top 10 carriers accounted for 63% of the world’s containership capacity, while in 2011, they accounted for approximately 66%.”
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