SAEL

Last Updated 17 February 2012

Maersk launches new service replacing closed-down MW1

Maersk will launch a new Middle East/West Mediterranen service, known as Middle East 2 (ME2), from late February

Port rotation will be: Jebel Ali, Salalah, Jeddah, Tangiers, Algeciras, Valencia, Barcelona, Jeddah, Salalah, Jebel Ali.

ME2 will operate with vessels around 4 000-TEU capacity, and the first westbound sailing is scheduled from Jebel Ali by the Maersk Dauphin on February 26.

The ME2 service is replacing the MW1 Middle East/West Africa service (Jebel Ali, Jeddah, Algeciras, Dakar, Lagos, Douala and back to Jebel Ali) – which, as FTWOnline reported on February 14, was closed down. All West Africa-bound cargo will now transship via Algeciras and connect onto the relevant West African service.

Primarily, the westbound volumes on the ME2 service will cater for transshipment volumes from the Middle East into West Africa by using the West Med transshipment centres. Eastbound, however, the main driver will be the Med/Middle East business, with West Africa transshipment cargo back to the Middle East taking a lower profile, said the line release to FTWOnline.

Line claims good performance in 2011

According to preliminary figures, Hapag-Lloyd, currently the world's fourth largest liner shipping company, claimed it performed well in the 2011 financial year, which it said was dominated by an “unexpectedly aggressive price war in the Far East trade” and sharp increases in oil and bunker prices.

In 2011, the line’s transport volume rose by 5.1% year on year to 5.2-million TEU, while the average freight rate remained virtually unchanged at US$1 532/TEU.

Hapag-Lloyd generated revenue of approximately EUR6.1-billion, which was only slightly less than 2010 (EUR6.2-bn) due to exchange rate fluctuations. Its operating result (adjusted EBIT) came to around EUR101-m, according to the preliminary figures.

Another company building coal line to Nacala

The Kazakhstan-based company, the Eurasian Natural Resources Corporation (ENRC) is planning to build a railway from the western Mozambiquan province of Tete to the northern port of Nacala, according to its general manager, Paul Craven.

Speaking in Cape Town to the Dow Jones Newsletter, reports news agency AIM, Craven said the ENRC railway was planned to handle an initial 60-million tonnes of coal a year. He expected the railway to be completed by 2015.

This is the second proposed railway from Tete to Nacala. The Brazilian mining company Vale is well advanced with plans for a railway, with an estimated cost of US$4-billion, which will run from its open cast mine in Moatize through southern Malawi to link up with the existing Malawi-Nacala line.

The problem for all the companies investing in the vast coal deposits in Tete is how to move the coal to export markets. The existing railway to the port of Beira, the Sena line, can only handle six million tonnes a year, with a possibility of doubling that figure if improvements are made.

Nacala is an attractive option, since it is generally regarded as the best deep water harbour on the east African coast. Unlike Beira, Nacala does not require dredging. But to reach Nacala from Tete, new railways are needed.

Lines face stiff resistance to highest Asia-Europe rate hikes since 2008

The largest ever rate increases announced by main carriers on the Asia-Europe trade - their latest attempt to recover from losses sustained in 2011 - will be a test of the shipping lines’ resolve to restore rates to more sustainable levels, reports UK publication, IFW.

The announced increases of between US$300 and US$800 per TEU are the highest quantum proposed by carriers since the abolition of conferences on the European trades in 2008, according to analysts at Alphaliner.

But, Alphaliner added, carriers will face stiff resistance to these biggest price hikes in years.

Air Mauritius to suspend ‘loss-making’ routes

Air Mauritius is to suspend several “loss-making” routes in light of poor third quarter financial results.
From the end of October, the airline’s Durban service will fly via Johannesburg; Frankfurt, Geneva and Munich via Paris; and Bangalore via Mumbai and Chennai. From May, the Milan flight will operate via Paris and Sydney/Melbourne via Perth.
Air Mauritius, along with its competitors, was severely hit by the 2008 crisis in the airline industry. The company recorded losses of €3.2 million for the third quarter against a profit of € 12.2 million for the same period in the previous year, according to etnw.

SA-Turkey trade ‘well below potential’

Trade and Industry Minister Dr Rob Davies told delegates at a South Africa-Turkish Business Forum that held at Istanbul this week that bilateral relations between South Africa and Turkey were well below potential.
”In 2009, trade between South Africa and Turkey decreased significantly and this was mainly due to the global economic crisis. In total, trade decreased from R10.6 billion in 2008 to R5.1 billion in 2009 and further to R4.9 in 2010 after an upward trend from 2006 to 2008.”
Davies that the trade decrease was of concern and there was certainly room to grow the volume of two-way trade and investment, create a more diversified balance of SA exports, and a greater proportion of beneficiated and higher value goods and services in South Africa’s export basket to Turkey

Researchers reveal flaw in online banking security

Researchers on Wednesday revealed a flaw in the way data is scrambled to protect the privacy of online banking, shopping and other kinds of sensitive exchanges.
A programme used to generate random number sequences for encrypting digital information worked properly 99.8 percent of the time, meaning that two out of every thousand "keys" wouldn't thwart crooks or spies, the report warned.
"We found that the vast majority of public keys work as intended," said a report based on work by a team of US and European researchers led by Arjen Lenstra of Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne (EPFL).
"A more disconcerting finding is that two out of every one thousand RSA moduli that we collected offer no security."
Online rights champion Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) supplied key data for the research, and said that Lenstra's team found tens of thousands of keys that essentially failed to guard data in supposedly encrypted online sessions.
"The consequences of these vulnerabilities are extremely serious," the EFF's Dan Auerbach and Peter Eckersley said in a blog post.
"In all cases, a weak key would allow an eavesdropper on the network to learn confidential information, such as passwords or the content of messages, exchanged with a vulnerable server."
Hackers could also pose as trusted websites, such as an online bank, in what are referred to as man-in-the-middle attacks, according to the EFF.
The non-profit EFF said it was working "around the clock" with EPFL to warn operators of computer servers using encryption keys offering no protection.

Captain dies – aircraft lands safely

A CSA Czech Airlines plane made an emergency landing in Prague on Wednesday after the captain collapsed and died in mid-flight, according to a Reuters report.
The co-pilot landed the ATR turbo-prop aircraft without any problems and the safety of the passengers was not at risk, according to the report.

N3 southbound closed for several hours after two-truck accident

The N3 southbound near Pinetown was closed for several hours yesterday after an 18-wheeler truck crashed into the back of another, resulting in one death and another serious injury.

News supplied by www.cargoinfo.co.za

back to top of page