SIMIC

THE 2M Alliance has confirmed that the Asia-North Europe loop is to be suspended after successive weeks of blank sailings, reports London's Loadstar.
It is the first alliance service on the tradelane to be officially cancelled and is likely to be followed by the removal of more in the weeks to come as ocean carriers faced with much reduced demand.
According to Alphaliner, the AE1/Shogun loop has been cancelled each week since early December by 2M partners Maersk and MSC. It had deployed twelve 13,000 to 20,500-TEU vessels, turning in 11 weeks, calling at Ningbo, Xiamen, Yantian, Tanjung Pelepas, Rotterdam, Bremerhaven, Rotterdam, Tanger Med, Salalah, Hong Kong and then back to Ningbo.
Alphaliner said Maersk and MSC had announced changes to the Asia-North Europe networks of three of their other five loops to compensate for the service termination. A call at Xiamen had been added to the rotation of the AE10/Silk loop, and the double Rotterdam call would be covered by a westbound call on the AE6/Lion loop and an eastbound call on the AE55/Griffin service.
The 2M's decision to suspend the AE1/Shogun service rather than keep voiding each voyage will be welcomed by shippers, which have found it increasingly difficult to navigate their way around the separate blanking advisories.
Many have complained about the often last-minute blanking strategy of the shipping lines, leading to uncertainty in the supply chain for importers and exporters.
Indeed, it was a point acknowledged by Hapag-Lloyd CEO Rolf Habben Jansen last week during a panel discussion, with shippers debating the post-Covid challenges faced by the liner industry.
He argued that if demand visibility was seen to be weaker for a long period, such as is the case at present, "then it is better to restructure a service network than to constantly blank".