The NYK Research Group is predicting a 7.0 percent growth this year in the global container cargo traffic from Asia to Europe and the US over the medium term compared to the double-digit growth in past, mb.com.ph reports. "It is inconceivable that future intensification in container cargo movement from Asia to Europe and the U.S. will ever realize the same double-digit growth of the past," said NYK president Yasumi Kudo. Kudo noted that abrupt acceleration in the speed of imports of iron ore and other resources to China up until 2008 surpassed NYK's expectations on a grand scale. "As a consequence, supply was utterly unable to catch up, and the period between 2003 and 2008 saw an unprecedented and quite abnormal soaring market. While supply has now completely caught up with demand, the rate of expansive growth of imports to China has now started to decelerate."
Kudo said the fortunate days of differentiation based solely on having vessels in one’s possession to deal with unexpected increase in both the volume and cycle of cargo movement are long gone. "Despite the over-heated demand has been cooled down, the new vessels will continue to be built for some time, which caused by the time-lag between order and delivery."
"The new medium-term management plan, “More Than Shipping 2013 (MTS2013),” launched in April this year, is our answer. “More Than Shipping’ implies a ‘shipping with Value-Added strategy, but more specifically, this is a survival strategy that will enable differentiation in the areas of ‘value-added services beyond traditional shipping’ and ‘vessels equipped with advanced safety, operation, and maneuvering.”
Kudo said global logistics would increase in accordance with the rise in population. The global movement in containers is thus anticipated to increase by roughly 7 percent, he said. "On the other hand, the building of new containerships is expected to increase on an annual scale by a substantial 10 percent until around 2013." "It is subsequently easy to predict that the market will deteriorate given this gap between demand and supply, which means that the question of how to overcome this issue will be the greatest challenge that we face.
Kudo stressed that the NYK Group would not endeavor to compete with other shipping companies on the basis of containership fleet size, but rather will stay ahead by focusing on cargo collection capacity and volumes. "With the clear excesses of space on vessels and the anticipated development of even more energy-efficient vessels at some point in the near future, there is no current need to construct ships. Rather, at this point in time, we shall continue to implement our light-asset strategy whereby we charter vessels and space when required," Kudo added.
Kudo said the fortunate days of differentiation based solely on having vessels in one’s possession to deal with unexpected increase in both the volume and cycle of cargo movement are long gone. "Despite the over-heated demand has been cooled down, the new vessels will continue to be built for some time, which caused by the time-lag between order and delivery."
"The new medium-term management plan, “More Than Shipping 2013 (MTS2013),” launched in April this year, is our answer. “More Than Shipping’ implies a ‘shipping with Value-Added strategy, but more specifically, this is a survival strategy that will enable differentiation in the areas of ‘value-added services beyond traditional shipping’ and ‘vessels equipped with advanced safety, operation, and maneuvering.”
Kudo said global logistics would increase in accordance with the rise in population. The global movement in containers is thus anticipated to increase by roughly 7 percent, he said. "On the other hand, the building of new containerships is expected to increase on an annual scale by a substantial 10 percent until around 2013." "It is subsequently easy to predict that the market will deteriorate given this gap between demand and supply, which means that the question of how to overcome this issue will be the greatest challenge that we face.
Kudo stressed that the NYK Group would not endeavor to compete with other shipping companies on the basis of containership fleet size, but rather will stay ahead by focusing on cargo collection capacity and volumes. "With the clear excesses of space on vessels and the anticipated development of even more energy-efficient vessels at some point in the near future, there is no current need to construct ships. Rather, at this point in time, we shall continue to implement our light-asset strategy whereby we charter vessels and space when required," Kudo added.