The president of the Port Authority of Valencia (APV), Aurelio Martinez, predicts that in 2022 freight prices will be adjusted, after the large increase in recent times, so that in 2023 the situation will normalise “although they will never be like the values of a few years ago”. In the case of the Valencian Containerised Freight Index (VCFI), this has gone from 1,101 points in December 2019 to 4,428 in March this year, according to Valenciaport's release.
The head of Valenciaport took part in the seminar to present the VCFI annual report in which different experts analysed the evolution of maritime traffic and the economic situation.
During his speech, Martínez explained the demand and supply factors on which freight rates depend, such as GDP growth, the evolution of international trade, protectionism in all its forms, business strategies, energy prices and environmental measures as exogenous factors that are outside the sector. On the other hand, the variants of the sector itself are conditioned by the balance of supply, the incorporation of new ships and the scrapping of obsolete ships, idle capacity/total capacity, cost reduction or blank sailings (cancellation of port calls).