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RAPID
development of containerships with reefer
plugs has been so pronounced that the expansion
of the Panama Canal now heralds a new era
of deploying economies of scale to ship
vast quantities of perishables to the right
place at the right price.
And
that's Europe.
With
the increase in European consumption of
these goods, the reefer trade is expected
to grow exponentially in the coming years,
writes Argelis Moreno De Ducreux, the Panama
Canal Authority's vice president for planning
and development.
Europe
is key, she writes in Fort Lauderdale's
Maritime Executive. The Panama Canal expansion
will bring new opportunities to this market
segment, offering the capacity necessary
to respond to this growth, which will boost
the trade in refrigerated products.
In
fact, the average vessel capacity from the
west coast of South America to Europe is
3,510 TEU, making this route the highest
container reefer capacity and the most important
for the movement of perishable goods with
an average of 20 per cent reefer plugs on
board.
Transport
development and new technologies are also
impacting the trade of perishable goods
in refrigerated containers.
Today,
the main trade through the Panama Canal
consists of containerised cargo loaded on
container vessels, but in recent years,
there has been a transition from conventional
reefer cargo vessels to container vessels.
This trend will continue with the addition
of new services through the Panama Canal
that will better serve the refrigerated
cargo market and its trade route.
The
Panama Canal expansion will bring new opportunities
to this market segment, offering the capacity
necessary to respond to this growth, which
will boost the trade in refrigerated products.
Recent
trends suggest that the supply chain will
shift from container vessels to more versatile
reefer containers. Containerships on the
other hand will only be required to offer
reefer plugs, because the technology change
has made in the container itself, contrary
to the conventional reefer fleet where the
investment in technology has to be made
for the entire cargo compartments. This
flexibility of containerships allows liner
services to carry all types of refrigerated
commodities.
According
to Drewry, from a capacity perspective,
the existing global containership fleet
provides 1.8 million reefer TEU. That's
93.9 per cent of the world's reefer ship
capacity.
>From
the demand perspective, in 2014, the worldwide
perishable trade was 189.5 million tons
and 55 per cent was seaborne; 75.4 per cent
of total seaborne reefer cargo was transported
in reefer containers and that is expected
to increase to 82.3 per cent or 19.4 million
tons by 2019, being meat, poultry, fish,
seafood and bananas, the main traded commodities.
These
investments indicate the high demand shippers
are experiencing for transporting refrigerated
commodities.
With
the Panama Canal expansion, the temperature-controlled
logistics industry will benefit from neopanamax
container vessels that will move twice,
or even triple, the amount of cargo possible
today.
Currently,
growing demand and use of reefer boxes is
facilitated by continued technological advancements
in the cold-chain industry, all of which
has led to substantial shifts in the transshipment
options available to shippers. Containership
operators now offer technologies that extend
the life of goods and slow down the ripening
of products.
For
instance, new reefer containers can control
temperatures within plus or minus of 0.25
of a degree Celsius with a 65 per cent reduction
in energy consumption compared to earlier
technologies. These containers are also
able to control carbon dioxide to slow ripening
and remove ethylene produced by fruits and
vegetables that might otherwise deteriorate
surrounding products.
More
importantly, refrigerated container vessels
are able to preserve the cold chain during
the entire shipment cycle. Due to minimal
handling, reefer containers maintain the
same temperatures from the producer to consumer,
guaranteeing the extended life of a product.
The
strong transition into reefer containerships
is already evident today.
In
fiscal year 2015, nearly 18 per cent of
the total TEU moved through the canal were
reefers. To date in this fiscal year, 13.1
million long tons of reefer cargo has been
transported through the waterway and containerships
made up 74.6 per cent of this cargo. Currently,
there are eight liner services via Panama
Canal that serve this trade route.
However,
with the opening of the expanded canal,
carriers have shown new interest in moving
from panamax to neopanamax containerships
vessels of about 6,500 TEU.
Merging
actual services could be an option to handle
this cargo in bigger vessels. Carriers and
shippers are likely to take advantage of
the cost reductions and the advantages of
containerised reefer cargo provided by the
use of larger ships.
The
highly anticipated expansion of the Panama
Canal will increase the maximum TEU capacity
of reefer vessels and help Panama increase
its exports of perishable goods.
The
Panama Canal will continue to invest in
new shipment options and adapt to changing
trade patterns for years to come. The Panama
Canal expansion will bring new opportunities
to this market segment, offering the capacity
necessary to respond to this growth, in
turn boosting the trade of refrigerated
products.
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