BWR: Carriers upgrade ECSA-Africa loop

BlueWater Reporting revealed ocean carriers operate four container services on the east coast of South America-to-Africa trade, however the SAMWAF is the only dedicated East Coast South America-to-Africa service.    Ocean carriers are strengthening trade between the east coast of South America and Africa by upgrading the SAMWAF with the Aug. 21 sailing of the Gerhard Schulte from Navegantes.
   Hapag-Lloyd, Hamburg Sud and subsidiary Alianca will then join the loop, which will have a new rotation of Navegantes, Paranagua, Santos, Rio de Janeiro, Durban, Port Elizabeth, Cape Town, Luanda, Pointe Noire and Navegantes. Pointe Noire will be called on a fortnightly basis, NileDutch said. Hapag-Lloyd, which will dub the service the “South America-Africa-Triangle,” will omit the Pointe Noire call all together.
   Once upgraded, the SAMWAF will operate with six vessels with an average capacity of 3,325 TEUs, according to CMA CGM’s proforma. CMA CGM will provide three vessels, Hamburg Sud will provide two vessels and NileDutch will provide one vessel.
   Ocean carriers Maersk Line and Delmas will continue to purchase slots on the loop, while Hapag-Lloyd and Alianca will become slot purchasers in conjunction with the new upgrade.
   The SAMWAF currently operates with a rotation of Rio Grande, Itajai, Santos, Rio de Janeiro, Pointe Noire and Luanda. According to ocean carrier schedule and capacity database BlueWater Reporting, the loop currently operates with two vessels with an average capacity of 3,465 TEUs, one each from CMA CGM and NileDutch.
   Although the upgraded SAMWAF will no longer connect Itajai or Rio Grande with mainland Africa, BlueWater Reporting’s Port Dashboard application illustrates how MOL’s CSW offers connections from Itajai to mainland Africa, while the Ipanema Service/ASAS3, jointly operated by Maersk Line and MSC, offers connections from Rio Grande to mainland Africa. Maersk Line and MSC are members of the 2M Alliance, however the two carriers act individually on the East Coast of South America to Africa trade, as alliances only cooperate on major east-west trades.
   Unlike the SAMWAF, both the CSW and Ipanema Service/ASAS3 do not offer capacity from mainland Africa back to South America’s east coast, and neither are dedicated to the east coast of South America-Africa trade, since they both call Asian ports in addition to the east coast of South America and Africa.
   The adjacent chart illustrates the weekly deployed capacity of both the CSW and the Ipanema Service/ASAS3, which deploy 5,820 and 8,352 TEUs a week, respectively.
   Overall, ocean carriers operate four services from the east coast of South America to Africa, as illustrated by BlueWater Reporting’s Capacity Report. The SAMWAF is the only dedicated service to the trade. Maersk Line and MSC’s joint Rumba/Bossa Nova service, which is included in this statistic, only calls Las Palmas in the African trade and does not call mainland Africa.
   In sum, a total of five ocean carriers – Maersk Line, MSC, CMA CGM, MOL and NileDutch – deploy capacity from South America’s east coast to Africa, as illustrated by BlueWater Reporting’s Carrier Trade Route Deployment Report. Once the SAMWAF upgrades, Hamburg Sud will become the sixth ocean carrier to deploy capacity from the east coast of South America to Africa.