Global ports join hands to improve Shipping

Leaders from the world's seven hub ports gathered in Shanghai vowing to join hands to cope with the challenging economic conditions.
Operators of seven ports — PSA International, Hutchison Port Holdings, APM Terminals, DP World, Port of Long Beach, Port of Rotterdam and Shanghai International Port (Group) Co Ltd (SIPG) — had their delegates attend the First Global Ports Leaders’ Conference in Shanghai.
The conference will become an annual event and serve as a port leaders' communication and exchange platform.

The delegates from the seven ports agreed to strengthen their bilateral or multi-lateral partnerships, jointly improve industrial standards, facilitate technology innovation and accelerate the integrated development of these ports.
By sharing experience, the seven ports will be able to learn from each other in the areas of operations, marketing, information application and safety management among other activities.
Choosing Shanghai as the venue for the first port summit has highlighted Shanghai's role as a global shipping center, said Chen Xuyuan, chairman of China’s largest port operator, SIPG.
SIPG processed 24.22 million 20-foot equivalent units (TEUs of containers) in the first nine months of this year, a growth of 1.9 percent year-on-year, according to Chen.
"It seems our yearly goal of 32.5 million TEUs is reachable. Therefore, SIPG will remain the world's No 1 (container port)," said Chen.
The 2013 Global Ports Leader's Exchange will be held in Singapore, with its theme centering on environment, safety and security.

India now trade-surplus with all Saarc partners

New Delhi : For the first time in years, India has become trade surplus with all  the South Asian countries, besides registering a 12.2% annual increase in overall Intra-Saarc trade at $15.5 billion in 2011-12. While India’s exports with its Saarc partners increased 11.78%, imports rose 14.96%, according to provisional figures obtained from the Commerce Ministry. New Delhi used to enjoy a surplus in trade with all the Saarc countries except Bhutan for the four year preceding 2011-12. Last year,it posted a surplus with the neighboring kingdom as well by $1.08 million. Sri Lanka is India’s largest trading partner in the Saarc followed by Bangladesh, Nepal and Pakistan. India has a free-trade pact with Sri Lanka, while Nepal enjoys duty-free access to Indian markets. Trade with other Saarc countries, namely Bhutan, Afghanistan and Maldives, is bolstered with their the least developed country (LDC) status.The potentialof tradeamongSaarc nations is settomultiply with the increased focus of these countries to tap Asian markets More aggressively in the wake of  the continuing global crisis that the resultant slump in trade with Europe and the US.
Another factor that would give an impetus to intra- Saarc Trade The Recent Decision Of Pakistan to grant most-favoured nation (MFN) status to India, which means non-discriminatory treatment to the country's exporters. Besides petroleum products, India exports pharmaceutical products, machinery, cotton and sugar, among others to all these countries. Petroleum products are not exported to Pakistan at present.
“We opened up the entire South Asian Free Trade Agreement (Safta) a few years back and the sensitive list in down to 25 tariff lines for the Least Developed Countries (LDCs) with the exception of liqueur and tobacco as they are considered demerit goods. Our intention is to increase trade with our neighbours,” said a Commerce Ministry official.

Saarc

In fact, the Cabinet recently approved the reduction of 30% (264 tariff lines,) from the Safta Sensitive list for Non Least Developed Countries (NLDCs), allowing the peak tariff  rates to reduce to 5% within three years, as per agreed Safta process of tariff liberalization. Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Maldives and Nepal benefited as a result of this trade liberalisation move. However, the trend of increasing trade surpluses has worried the ministry and experts alike who fear that the favourable trade balance of $10.5 billion may lead to other countries becoming insecure about India pushing too much for its exports in the subcontinent. “We urgently need to address the issue of adverse trade balance that every SAARC country has with us as we can't carry on with huge surpluses in our favour,”the official added.
“We need a healthy balance of exports and imports and extend the Safta concessions else other countries might act against us for not creating market opportunities for them.
We need to give more for greater political will,”explained Ajay Sahai, Director General and CEO,Federation of Indian Export Organisations.
Another fear pertains to the slowdown in the US and European Union, which might affect Saarc and, there by,intra-Saarc trade. “If exports from Saarc decline, then the capacity to import will also fall. The Saarc nations will not flood the Indian markets with imports if global trade declines. So, it is not an opportunity for the regions,”noted Sahai

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What are Chinamax Ships?

Classifying vessels after port or harbor facilities is a popular and common norm in the maritime domain. Chinamax is a classification of ship type based on the dead weight tonnage or carrying capacity of bulk carriers.
Often classed under the ambit of VLOCs (Very Large Ore Carriers), the Chinamax ships are also synonymously tagged as Valemax vessels. Although not an official categorization  Valemax ships gain their name and reputation from their engaging company, the Brazilian shipping conglomerate Vale.

Brazil has been a key operator since the initial heydays of ore supplying operations to China with the Vale conglomerate strongly helping to address this demand. Although initially the most commonly utilised vessels to supply ores to the Oriental nation were the Capesize ships, in the year 2011, the company came up with its first purpose-built ore carrier ships, which came to be referred to as Chinamax ships and later on as Valemax ore carrying vessels.

The need to cater to Chinese demands for mass quantities of ore-based cargo in a cost-efficient way facilitated the development and rise of Chinamax vessels. Chinamax ships were thus primarily and solely intended to ply between Brazil and the various Chinese harbour facilities, to provide the required mass quantities of ores in the least time-period possible. Presently, just as the ore-based trade industry is not restricted to Brazil and China, even the utilisation of these bulk ships is not restricted only to the Chinese port and harbour facilities.

The categorisation of these bulk ships thereby entails to include all those harbour and port facilities that offer a faster unlading capacitance for the bulk ore-based cargo. Unlike other vessels’ classifications which are named for the meshing entryway limits set by authorities of important international water conduits, these bulk carrier ships are stipulated to certain preset dimensions and are amongst the world’s largest bulk carriers operating presently.

• The Chinamax vessels have a DWT (Dead Weight Tonnage) of up to 4, 00,000 tonnes

• These vessels measure about 360 metres lengthwise with a breadth of about 65 metres and a draft of about 25 metres

• About 35 vessels are expected to be launched by the Vale conglomerate under the Chinamax class of vessels in the year 2013

Problems Surrounding Chinamax Ships

Although the utilisation of Chinamax vessels bodes well in terms of management of time and high economic returns per voyage, owners and operators of smaller-sized bulk carrier ships feel that their returns have diminished.

Another aspect dimming the sheen on the efficiency of the largest bulk carriers is that of the number of port facilities that can cater to this variance of bulk cargo carrier.

While these are indeed well-contested points, maritime experts believe that the usage of these bulk carriers will help to streamline the maritime ore-based cargo operations, like no other previous yardsticks.

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