DAILY SHIPPING NEWS - THURSDAY NOVEMBER 24, 2016

Air Freight News :

Antonov to transfer An-124 sales to UK team after Ruslan JV ceases.

·         An-124 at Marseille

Antonov Airlines' team in the UK will takeover the sales and marketing of its An-124 aircraft after its joint venture with Volga-Dnepr that was set up to tout the aircraft comes to an end on December 31.

In the wake of confirmation from both Ukraine’s Antonov Company and Russia’s Volga-Dnepr Group that their Antonov An-124-100-operating joint venture (JV) company Ruslan International will cease operations, Antonov is moving swiftly to develop its own business.  In response to the end of the JV, the Antonov Airlines team in the UK will “take the lead in the global sales and operations of this unique cargo aircraft”.

Dreamlifts Ltd (trading as Antonov Airlines) is, it added, “managed by an international group of well-known experts from the outsize and heavyweight cargo industry".

"With decades of experience between them, Antonov Company expects a seamless transition for its customers in the global supply chain and a continuation of its flexible and highly personal service,” it said.

Antonov currently operates a fleet of seven An-124s, including the An-124-100M-150 – which boasts a payload of 150 tonnes. 

It also flies the world’s biggest freighter, the An-225 Mriya, which has a maximum cargo capacity of no less than 250 tonnes, and the world’s largest turboprop, the An-22 Antei.

Oleksandr Kotsiuba, Antonov Company president, commented: “Antonov Airlines’ activities are supported by Antonov Company’s in-house design and development capabilities providing unrivalled expertise for the most challenging logistic projects.

“As the maintenance authority and life extension authority, we will continue to offer these proven and reliable airframes to the market for many years to come.”

While the Ruslan JV is being wound up at the end of this year, Volga-Dnepr Group’s business collaboration with Antonov will continue for the technical aspects of airworthiness and flight safety support of its An-124-100 fleet.

This confirmation of continued technical collaboration followed a warning from Antonov in September that it may seek a ban on Volga-Dnepr flying An-124 aircraft if the Russian freight carrier moved support functions for the aircraft to another company.  The two companies created the Ruslan partnership in 2006.

Lufthansa Cargo to divide regions as part of management cull.

·         Lufthansa Cargo has revealed more details on how it will divide up its regions in order to offload a layer of management in line with its cost cutting programme.

The German airfreight giant will now operate with eight regions instead of the previous four to allow it to remove a management level.

The previous four business areas –Europe, Africa, America and Asia Pacific – will become West Europe, North and East Europe, Middle East and Africa, US and Canada, Latin America and Caribbean, North and North East Asia and Southeast Asia.

The move is part of the airline’s Cargo Evolution strategy; the airline group has announced plans to reduce staff numbers by 800 worldwide, including a 35% reduction in management numbers, and has laid up two of its MD-11 freighters.

As well as cost reduction measures, the cargo airline has launched a new basic cargo offering, added a service aimed at private individuals, will invest in other products, has expanded its partnerships to increase the reach of its network and began selling capacity on sister airline Eurowings, and acquired the full shareholding of urgent logistics firm time:matters.

In the third quarter, Lufthansa’s logistics division slipped to its sixth quarterly operating loss in a row as market overcapacity and weak demand continued to blight financial performance

IATA to launch e-AWB tool for forwarders.

·         IATA will launch a new low cost online tool that is designed to allow small and medium sized freight forwarders to send and receive electronic shipment data, such as electronic air waybills (e-AWB).

The platform allows users to create, send and manage air waybills, house bill and electronic consignment security declarations.

It also allows forwarders to receive status updates from airlines electronically and track shipment status and receive shipment alerts. Documents can also be printed from the system.

“eAWBLink provides a window to over 120 carriers through our industry partners. Overall the e-AWBLink is a tool that will simplify day-to-day business,” IATA said in a promotional video.

Partners included in the development of the tool are Mphasis, Descartes and Hewlett Packard Enterprises.  The launch of the new tool comes as the air cargo industry continues to struggle with the adoption of electronic technology.

Smaller forwarders and Customs agents in far flung areas of the world are often accused of holding up the development of electronic processes because they lack the systems that are deal with these.

The latest figures from IATA show that e-AWB adoption has continued to improve this year, although at a slower pace than had been hoped for.

At the start of the year e-AWBs accounted for 37.2% of the total number of air waybills that were processed.  By September this figure had edged up to 42%, but IATA’s target of 52% penetration by the end of the year now looks unlikely.

Sea Freight News :

Kochi port in South India tries out moving containers in barges Sea News TRIALS have begun of a new barge service that will transport containers from the Kochi International Container Transhipment Terminal (ICTT), also known as the Vallarpadam Terminal, to the Inland Container Depot (ICD) at Kottayam Port and Container Terminal (KPACT). Six empty containers were transported by the barge during the first trial run, and thereafter fully loaded containers will be used. The barge can carry a maximum of ten containers via the Thanneermukkom bund. The trial runs are intended to ensure the smooth passage of the barge through the waterway, along which some areas near the port have already been identified for dredging. Once the waterway is fit to accommodate the barge, the port will need be to equipped with a 50-tonne capacity gantry crane to load and unload the barge. Currently, the KPACT has authorised customs clearance and serves as an import and export hub in Kottayam. The import/export clearance facility at the ICD has been there since 2012.

Rites moots rail corridor to boost coastal coal shipping Business Standard Rites Ltd, the consultancy arm of Indian Railways, has proposed a heavy haul rail corridor connecting Salegaon (Maharashtra) with the Paradip port. The cost of the project is estimated at Rs 3,298 crore and it is being taken up mainly to boost coastal shipping of coal. Officials of Rites recently made a presentation on the proposed corridor to the Ministry of Coal. The project is proposed to be developed in two phases. In the first phase, the corridor will be built from Salegaon to Kandarpur near Cuttack — this is expected to be completed by 2021. This would help ease the congestion around Kandarpur. Subsequently, the corridor is planned to be extended to Paradip port. The commissioning of this phase is set to be co-terminus with an outer harbour planned by the major port under Government of India's Sagarmala initiative.

Cabinet Approves New Merchant Shipping Bill Outlook India The Cabinet today approved a new Merchant Shipping Bill by repealing the 58-year old law, a move that will promote ease of doing business, transparency and effective delivery of services. "The Cabinet, chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, has approved the Merchant Shipping Bill, 2016 for introducing it in Parliament," an official statement said. The Merchant Shipping Bill, 2016, is a revamped version of the Merchant Shipping Act, 1958. It provides for repealing of the Merchant Shipping Act, 1958, as well as the Coasting Vessels Act, 1838, it added. The Merchant Shipping Act, 1958, had become a bulky piece of legislation over the years as a result of various amendments carried out in the Act from time to time. It was amended 17 times between 1966 and 2014, resulting in an increase in the number of sections to over 560.

DMIDC logistic data bank service extended at JNPT Business Line Delhi Mumbai Industrial Corridor Development Corporation (DMICDC) today said it has commenced its logistic data bank service at fourth terminal of the Jawaharlal Nehru Port and also plans to expand the facility to other ports in the country. “DMICDC’s LDB service for tracking of container movement, which began operations at three terminals at the JNPT, has extended it to a fourth terminal, with discussions now under way to expand the pioneering service to other ports in the country,” DMIDC said in a statement issued here. LDB, a system for near real-time tracking of EXIM containers using RFID technology as they move across the western corridor of the country, was introduced in June at the JNPCT, NSICT and GTI terminals of the port where it has collectively tagged and de-tagged over 1.2 million containers so far.

India far behind in port related development than China India is far behind in all the key performance indicators related to port-led development than China, says a report recently published by the Ministry of Shipping. The report comes at a time when China in a bid to beat India in capturing wider space in the global economy has established linkage with Pakistan’s Gwadar port even as India prepares itself to access the Chabahar port in Iran. Underlining India’s inability to optimize on it’s richly endowed maritime advantages in the last half a century, the report says that China leads India by a factor of seven times to 16 times on the measured parameters. The report says that between ports and power production stations, India requires linkages that would optimize the cost of fuel transportation, a lack of which has caused high energy production cost.

DCI eyes foreign shores Times of India Having carried out large number of dredging operations at various ports along the Indian coastline, Vizag-based Dredging Corporation of India (DCI) is now looking at expanding its presence to the foreign shores. As part of its plans to tap into dredging projects abroad, DCI recently signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with a Bahrain-based company with an eye on securing contracts in the Middle East. The development comes after a gap of nearly four years as DCI had last worked on a dredging project in Sri Lanka in 2012. According to DCI officials, the Vizag-based public sector undertaking has signed a business cooperation memorandum with Riyada Group of Companies of Bahrain with a view to expand further opportunities and expand operations in Gulf Cooperation Council Countries and Middle East.

37 national waterway projects in next 3 years; Nagaland gets one Eastern Mirror Nagaland will have a ‘National Waterway’ in the coming years now that the central government has embarked upon developing major waterways in the country. So far the centre has announced 37 of said projects out of which Nagaland also has found a place. The national waterway for Nagaland stretches to around 42 KM. Which waterway it was, was not specified in the information given by Minister of State for Shipping Pon. Radhakrishnan in a written reply to a question in the Lok Sabha on November 17. A decision to undertake development of National Waterways declared under the National Waterways Act of 2016 is based on Techno Economic Feasibility Study and Detailed Project Report, commissioned on each of them, by the Inland Waterways Authority of India, the minister stated. The Act has been enforced with effect from the 12th of April 2016.

CRWC boosts rail side warehousing Bureaucracy Giving a boost to railside warehousing operations in India, the Central Railside Warehouse Company Ltd, a subsidiary of the Central Warehousing Corporation, is planning to set up 10 warehouses at railheads to store commodities besides upgrading its existing 19 warehousing complexes in India for Rs 200 crore. KU Thankachen, Managing Director of the CRWC, talks about its expansion plans. The railside warehousing operations of the Central Railside Warehouse Company Ltd started in 2003, with an understanding between a Miniratna PSU, Central Warehousing Corporation, and the Indian Railways. Initially the railside warehousing services were used as a transit warehouse, especially for bulk commodities which only required storage for a limited period. However, in 2007, the CRWC was made a separate subsidiary of the Central Warehousing Corporation.

Gwadar Port benefits to China limited Global Times The benefits of Pakistani Gwadar Port to the Chinese economy may be limited, as the port's capacity cannot satisfy China's oil import demand and a proposed pipeline from Gwadar to western China would be both economically and geographically infeasible and would raise crude transport costs by as much as 16 times, experts said. However, the port is a bonanza for Pakistan, experts said, noting that it will bring a string of opportunities for the country, including revitalizing its lackluster economy and attracting more foreign capital. Following the first trade cargo ships that departed from Gwadar on November 13, the National Business Daily (NBD) suggested China would benefit a lot from the port because of its strategic location. The port "is located on the Arabian Sea and occupies a strategic location," Bloomberg reported, giving China access to the Persian Gulf region and the Middle East.

Mergers: Commission approves container liner shipping merger between Hapag-Lloyd and UASC, subject to conditions New Europe The clearance is conditional on the withdrawal of UASC from a consortium on the trade routes between Northern Europe and North America, where the merged entity would have faced insufficient competitive constraint. Commissioner Margrethe Vestager, in charge of competition policy, said: “European companies rely on container liner shipping services for their transatlantic shipments. It’s very important that the markets remain open.The commitments offered by Hapag-Lloyd ensure that the takeover will not lead to price increases on the routes between Northern Europe and North America.” The transaction leads to the combination of two competitors in the container liner shipping business and will create the fifth largest container liner shipping company worldwide. Like several other carriers, UASC and Hapag-Lloyd offer their services on trade routes mainly through cooperation agreements with other shipping companies, known as “consortia” or “alliances”.

Why is Korea Line buying Hanjin Shipping's Asia - US container business? Seatrade Maritime The move by Korea Line to buy bankrupt Hanjin Shipping’s Asia – US container line business, that sees the company taking the plunge into the container trade at a very difficult time, is a head scratching one. Korea Line is paying $31.4m for the business, which includes the routes, customer information and operations in seven countries, including US, China and Vietnam, as well as some 574 employees from Hanjin. It does not, however, include five 6,500 containerships from Hanjin or its stake in a Long Beach container terminal in the US, which Korea Line has an option to buy. Korea Line apparently outbid Hyundai Merchant Marine (HMM) for the business, which was put up for sale by the Seoul bankruptcy court last month. While Hanjin clearly needs as much money it can get to pay off its debts, HMM, despite its own travails, would have been a more logical choice in terms of guaranteeing the future of Hanjin’s Asia – US business as it is a space it is already operating in.

Maersk confirms HMM not joining 2M Alliance but looking at other options Sea News Following everal months of discussions, Maersk Line and Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC) have decided against admitting Korean line Hyundai Merchant Marine (HMM) into their 2M container shipping alliance, opting instead to explore various lower-level partnership options. Confirming the decision with Lloyd's Loading List, Maersk Line said: "The parties have discussed the possibility of HMM joining 2M as an operating partner and now decided to look at other cooperation possibilities. "The parties are therefore discussing the possibility of HMM partnering with the 2M network through a slot exchange and purchase agreement. The partnership discussions are ongoing and include the possibility of Maersk Line taking over charters and operations of vessels currently chartered to HMM with the aim of deploying them in the 2M network.