COSCO CANCELS THREE-MONTH-OLD ASIA/EAST MED LINK

COSCO CANCELS THREE-MONTH-OLD ASIA/EAST MED LINK    China Ocean Shipping Co. has ended its Asia/Eastern Mediterranean AEM container service after just three months of operation.
   An Italian source close to the Chinese carrier said the move was due to “services reorganization saving costs.”
   COSCO will instead focus on the slot exchange agreement it has in the Asia/Mediterranean trade with Zim Israel Navigation Co., taking space on the Israeli carrier’s weekly Asia Med Pacific service. In return, Zim takes slots on COSCO’s weekly Asia/Western Mediterranean AMX service.
   The AEM service used eight vessels averaging 1,893 TEUs and called Shanghai, Hong Kong, Singapore, Haifa, Piraeus, Trieste, Haifa, Singapore, Hong Kong, Shanghai. The end of the service will see a reduction of almost 100,000 TEUs in annual one-way capacity in the trade.