Review of Black Sea container market in January-September 2015

In January-September 2015, Black Sea container terminals of Romania, Ukraine, Russia, Georgia and Bulgaria handled 1,723,269 TEUs including empty containers and excluding transshipment.

The review provided to IAA PortNews by Informall BG covers only loaded containers – 1,213,657 TEUs which is 13.35 percent decrease against January-September 2014.

In 9M’15, total turnover of loaded containers in the region fell by 13.35%, year-on-year.

Container throughput of Black Sea region in 9M’15-9M’14, TEU loaded 

The growth of container throughput was shown by Bulgaria and Romania. The terminals of Ukraine, Russia and Georgia demonstrated a fall of 28.38%, 15.01% and 10.60% accordingly.

Black Sea container terminals

Imports account for 52.77% of containers handled in the region in 9M’15, exports – 47.23%. Loaded/empty containers ratio in the region is 70.43% / 29.57%.

Imports account for 52.77% of containers handled in the Black Sea Region

As compared with January-September 2014, exports of loaded containers in the Black Sea region fell by 0.53%. Ukraine showed the steepest fall - 17%. The growth was demonstrated by Georgia (35.09%), Bulgaria, Russia and Romania. As for imports into the region, it dropped by 22.31% mostly due to reduced imports to Ukraine (-38.90%). Other countries also showed imports reduction.  

Ukraine’s imports fell by 38.90%

Handling of loaded containers in the reported period per country is as follows: Romania – 26.76%, Russia – 25.67%, Ukraine – 22.05%, Georgia – 16.88%, Bulgaria – 8.64%.

Shares of Black Sea countries in total turnover of loaded containers in 9M’15

As for total container throughput, the list of top five container terminal changed with DPW (Constanta) having retained its leading position, HPC Ukraine (Odessa) rising from the 5^th to the 3^rd position, APMT Poti (Georgia) having retained its 2^nd position, Novoroslesexport (Russia) falling from the 3^rd to the 4^th position and NUTEP (Russia) falling from the 4^th to the 5^th position. Four of the top five terminals of the region demonstrated the fall of container throughput. Container throughput of DPW (Constanta) grew by 0.10%.

Shares of Black Sea terminals in 9M’15

As for operators of Black Sea lines, the list of leaders includes Maersk Line, MSC, CMA CGM, ARKAS and ZIM.  is as follows did not change in 2014: Maersk Line, MSC, CMA CGM, ARKAS и ZIM.  ARKAS pushed ZIM down from the 4^th to the 5^th position. Maersk Line has taken the leading position having pushed MSC to the second place.  The above lines control 74.23% of the market of loaded containers in the Black Sea region.

MAERSK, MSC, CMA CGM, ARKAS and ZIM control 74.23% of the market

Shares of Black Sea lines in 9M’15

The service of G6 (Hapag Lloyd, OOCL, MOL, NYK, HMM, APL) was reorganized from the middle of 2014. OOCL moved to ZIM and G6 alliance became G5. In January-September 2014, G5 members controlled 6.21% of the market, in January-September 2015 – their share declined to 5.75%. The share of OOCL declined from 2.25% in 9M’14 to 1.88% in 9M’15.

The first quarter of 2015 saw the beginning of joint activities of 2М (Maersk and MSC) and Ocean Three (CMA CGM, CSCL, UASC) alliences. Total share of MAERSK and MSC in the market increased by 1.67 p.p. from 45.35% in 9M’14 to 47.02% in 9M’15. The share of Ocean Three increased by 0.84 p.p. from 12.78% in 9M’14 to 13.62% in 9M’15.

The review has been contributed to IAA PortNews by Informall BG.