Below is a snapshot of the current global shipping status to Australia and New Zealand:
From North Europe/UK:
Extensive backlogs of cargo in most Northern European/UK ports with most shipping lines fully booked in advance, rates on all services again increased for July/August shipment as a result of strong demand for space.
Hamburg port is the most severely affected with congestion and delays and lack of available space at this time.
Indian Sub Continent:
Heavily backlogged in all Indian Sub-Continent ports, many shipping lines not accepting bookings to Australia and all lines booked up to 4-6 weeks in advance.
USA/Canada:
Severe backlogs at all ports and rail hubs, shortage of empty equipment and trucking services at a premium.
Lengthy delays in San Francisco port with vessels waiting up to 15-20 days to gain access to a berth. Los Angeles/Long Beach port working at over capacity, volumes up by 20% over 2020. Vessels waiting at anchorage 10-15 days for berth access.
Houston port volumes have increased by39% over 2020 with truck and chassis availability remaining limited.
New York port also showing double digit volume increases over 2020, Philadelphia and Savannah port both extremely busy and showing large growth in volumes of containers handled.
Extensive delays in receiving bookings from all USA shipping lines, direct services to Australia booked for next 4-6 weeks, many transhipment services via Asia now not accepting any bookings until such time as the backlog in USA and Asia is cleared.
Toronto and Montreal ports heavily backlogged and bookings “challenging†to obtain, Vancouver port heavily impacted by recent wild fires in British Colombia that has cut one rail line from East Coast Canada and is delaying all containers on the rail service.
South East Asia:
Again, all services heavily booked, some lines avoiding Jakarta port calls due to backlog, Vietnam ports also showing heavy congestion and further disruption expected as Vietnam deals with a serious outbreak on COVID virus again over the past week.
Malaysian transhipment hub at Port Klang extremely heavily backlogged with transhipment delays of up to 4-5 weeks being experienced.
Singapore transhipment hub now experiencing up to 6 weeks delays due to the massive volume of cargo backlogged and continuing to arrive.
Services from Thailand heavily booked on all shipping lines.
North East Asia:
China, Taiwan, Korea and Japan ports are handling the highest volumes of containers ever seen but still managing to move most containers, albeit with some delays in the higher volume ports. Space on all carriers remains at a premium, all vessels departing NE Asian ports loaded to capacity.
The recent closure of Yantian port due to an outbreak of COVID virus has certainly added to the delays in Shenzhen and Pearl River Delta ports, with many of those ports now only using Hong Kong (instead of Shenzhen) as there connection hub to ocean vessels to Australia.
New Zealand:
Auckland port remains a bottleneck of cargo, many lines now avoiding calls in Auckland until the situation improve