After signs of progress that the backlogs of containerships
stacked up outside ports might be easing, it appears that the trend is
reversing itself. With lockdowns impacting the movement of vessels at the major
Chinese ports, the congestion appears to be spreading to other ports around the
globe.
New data from Windward, the maritime AI company, shows that
a fifth of all the world’s containerships are stuck in port congestion.
Further, they calculate that a quarter of all the ships are specifically stuck
at Chinese ports. Carriers have been struggling to manage their schedules which
have already shown low reliability. Now, there are increasing reports of the
number of containerships diverting away from Shanghai, but that is adding to
the delays at other ports such as Ningbo-Zhoushan due to the added volumes, or
carriers are resorting to blanked sailings.
The increases align with the lockdown in Shanghai that began
at the end of March. Just before that, Sea-Intelligence reported the first
improvement in schedule reliability in two years. While nearly two-thirds of
all containerships were still behind schedule in February 2022,
Sea-Intelligence’s monthly Global Liner Performance report highlighted that
reliability returned to levels not experienced since mid-2021. Further, they
reported that the number of days vessels were behind schedule while still high
had also improved.
“The lockdowns in China are heavily impacting the congestion
outside the country’s ports,” writes Windward based on data pulled for its
Maritime AI platform and released on April 19. “The number of container vessels
waiting outside of Chinese ports today is 195 percent higher than it was in
February.”
Windward uses three images each providing a 48-hour snapshot
of container vessels waiting outside of China’s ports to illustrate their
analysis. They compare February when there were no lockdowns in China to March
when Shenzhen was in lockdown, and now April as the lockdown reached Shanghai a
city of 25 million people and home to the world’s busiest container port.
“The trend is clear – in the April and March snapshots,
there were 506 and 470 vessels, respectively, stuck outside of Chinese ports.
In February, that number was only 260. In essence, lockdowns in China have
nearly doubled the congestion outside the country’s ports,” concludes Windward.
Chinese officials continue to insist that the port of
Shanghai is open and functioning. They point to the use of a closed-loop where
port workers were placed inside a bubble separated from the city and people
coming and going to the port. Truckers have been required for example to have
negative COVID-19 tests to enter the port and truck traffic has been greatly
reduced. Still, the ports are experiencing shortages of employees due to the
spread of the virus.
While it would seem that with so many vessels stuck off
China that other ports might be seeing relief, the opposite appears to be
happening with schedules being disrupted for many of the major shipping routes.
The Marine Exchange of Southern California’s data for example shows the number
of container vessels again on the rise. On April 4, just as the lockdowns began
in Shanghai, California reached a new low on its containership traffic with a
total of 33 ships heading to Los Angeles and Long Beach. Today, by comparison,
the Southern California backlog has jumped to 51 containerships, either near
shore or steam toward the ports.
“When looking at the global picture, between April 12-13,
2022, 1,826 container vessels were waiting outside of ports worldwide,” reports
Windward. “That’s 20 percent of all container vessels globally!”
Windward’s Maritime AI data shows that 506 vessels are
waiting offshore at China’s ports which represents more than a quarter (27.7
percent) of all the ships waiting outside of ports around the world. For
comparison, in February, Windward calculates that the backlog off China’s ports
accounted for about a sixth (14.8 percent) of the vessels stuck in port
congestion worldwide.
Shanghai has begun to report some progress containing the
recent wave of the virus and a decline in the number of daily cases. The health
authorities have begun to relax some restrictions permitting factories to
resume work using a closed-loop keeping workers onsite but it is unclear when
the port can begin to regain its normal productivity. Even then there are fears
of another ripple effect around the globe as shippers rush to move goods that
have been stuck in the supply chain and carriers rush vessels to international
ports seeking to restore disrupted schedules.