Trade from Asia into Africa, particularly along the continent’s western seaboard, has pushed container volumes up by 10.1% since 2019, the year before the Covid-19 global outbreak, shipbroking advisory Maersk Broker has reported.
The last time containerisation into Africa surged was last year’s increase of 6.7%.
More specifically, West Africa currently accounts for a 20% year-on-year growth in seaborne trade.
It’s not just trade from Asia, though, that’s adding to the volume increase into the west coast of Africa as the Middle East and South America have also contributed to expanded volumes.
Asia though has the lion’s share of TEU trade into the continent’s western seaboard, with improved figures of 22.3% year-on-year (y-o-y).
Asia Shipping Media reports that “according to data from Container Trade Statistics, the Asia-Africa market is the strongest growing ex-Asia market in 2023, having seen August 2023 year-to-date, y-o-y volume growth of 19.6%, far better than the global contraction of -3.3%.”
But the continent’s Asian figures pall in comparison to leading economies as it only accounts for 3.2% of global sea trade so far this year.
Asia-US container volumes for the year-to-date is at 17.9% and at 14.7% for Asia-Europe.
