The mighty Amazon River’s water level is so low that CMA CGM has informed its clients that it cannot deliver containers along it at present and must wait for the level to rise.
In an advisory to its clients, it said the draught restrictions directly affected the cargo capacity with which ships can navigate the river, limiting shipments and discharges at the Port of Manaus, a principal shipping hub along the river.
Manaus is located in northwest Brazil in the heart of the Amazon rainforest. It lies on the northern bank of the Negro River above its junction with the Amazon River. The first European settlement was a small fort built by the Portuguese in 1669 and is the capital of the Amazonas state in Brazil and is a primary economic hub for the Brazilian Amazon.
“CMA CGM would like to warn you that these limited conditions have reached an alarming level, impeding line container vessels to access the port. The weather conditions that generated these restrictions are unstable, which does not allow us to accurately provide a forecast of improvement. As a result, CMA CGM has no other option than to divert its vessels (MANAUS SHUTTLE Service) to other ports and apply the below contingency plan:
“Cargoes on board these vessels will be shipped to Manaus as soon as the water level allows and we are working on alternative solutions,” its client alert read.
Over the past 26 years, exports from Brazil to South Africa have increased at an annualised rate of 5.54%, from $296 million in 1995 to $1.2 billion in 2021. In 2021, South Africa exported $857m worth of products to Brazil. The main products exported from South Africa to Brazil were platinum ($364m), raw aluminium ($132m), and pesticides ($52.3m), according to the United Nations COMTRADE database.
