ALAN PEAT WITH THE on-going demise of shipping line conferences and other line bodies, it is now proving difficult to get figures indicating trends in freight rates and the like in the industry. Research of individual lines too often proves fruitless, and the remaining shipping bodies in the trade profess not too have such statistics available. But, in researching the issue of rates on the various trades, FTW was at least able to get one shipping executive – who preferred to remain anonymous – to reveal the basic trends in his line’s records – although referring only to the SA-Far East trade. We first queried last year’s rate movements, asking the executive to compare his figures to those from an FTW reader poll we conducted last February - where 52% expected moderate increases, 15% substantial and 33% none at all. “On the Asia trade,” he said, “the 52% of readers who forecast moderate increases were correct. There were some increments last year, but all of them small.” However, the talk in the trade would seem to indicate that the supply-demand situation is right this year for more rates increases – and it would seem that the sea carriers are looking to implement four rate increases during 2007, with one of them the peak-season surcharge that inevitably arises during the pre-Christmas rush. “If the trade continues to boom, with China a driving force behind it,” the line executive told FTW, “I think the carriers will be justified in increasing their rates.”
