“It will be one or two years of ocean container freight rates tending to move slowly lower while simultaneously, reliability will improve step-by-step, up to something closer to normal.”
Mr Vogel said the “bad news” was that ocean container freight rates were unlikely to return to the levels experienced before the pandemic, where “they had been extremely cheap”. However, further extreme price rises to – or above – the highs of the fourth quarter in 2021 were also not expected.
“The overall picture is a rather positive one, where we do not expect to see those rates explode suddenly again, or that there will be another massive disruption in the chain,” he said.
Rabobank expects schedule reliability for containers to also recover, albeit slowly. Congestion is forecast to remain at key ports until the first half of next year.
The bank’s analysts said reliability of ocean container freight schedules had dropped from almost 80 per cent pre-pandemic to about 30 per cent. Continued port congestion and the slow addition of new shipping capacity were contributing to uncertain reliability.
Mr Nguyen said the global shipping sector was highly reliant on China, exposing it to geopolitical risks such as trade wars and bans.
“China owns the busiest ports, while supplying 95 per cent of the containers in the world,” he said.
“China’s production container capacity surged 130 per cent year-on-year in 2021 under record high container prices and demand.”
Port vulnerability exposed
Port congestion remained a major contributor to ongoing supply disruptions, Rabobank said.
Various steps had been taken to improve efficiency but structural factors – including a lack of co-ordination between ocean and land transport, labour shortages with uncertain union negotiations, disrupted trade flow and a general lack of automation – continued to expose vulnerability at ports.
Surging consumer spending during COVID-19 drove demand for ocean carriers and containers, with retailers rushing to replenish depleted inventories.
Rabobank said an imbalance in global trade flows was thwarting the cost-effective repositioning of empty containers.
The situation was worse for reefer (refrigerated) containers, due to huge differences in imports and exports of agri-food commodities between regions.
“Nearly a third of reefer containers are currently stuck in Asia, mainland China; exporting regions including Central and South America, Oceania and South Africa will continue experiencing reefer shortages,” the bank’s research report said.
Mr Nguyen said the Ukraine war was creating further uncertainty, especially in the dry bulk sector.
Sanctions against Russia had held up shipping and containers around the world, making them inaccessible.
