DHL integrates Southeast Asia road network

DHL integrates Southeast Asia road network    DHL said Wednesday it is offering both bonded and non-bonded cross-border full or less-than-truckload service between Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand.
   The company estimates the scheduled cross-border road freight service could help businesses reduce freight cost by up to 25 percent compared to air freight, and benefit from the shorter transit time of at least one day relative to ocean freight on a port-to-port basis.
   'In the past year, we have seen an increasing demand for road freight service in addition to air and ocean freight services,' said DHL Global Forwarding South Asia Pacific. 'The volume of goods transported overland between the three countries is poised to grow between 2009 and 2014, with the movement of goods in the automotive, electronics and consumer goods industries expected to register an annual compounded growth rate of 8 percent each.'
   Bilateral trade between Malaysia and Thailand increased from $15 billion in 2006 to $19.6 billion in 2008, while Malaysia is also Singapore’s top trading partner with bilateral trade reaching $78 billion in 2008, a 1.4 percent increase from the year before.
   'Traditionally, shipments are transported into Bangkok for domestic distribution in Thailand,' DHL Global Forwarding South Asia said. 'However, we recognized the growing demand in southern Thailand and designed our service to enable goods transported into Thailand to be cleared at the border in Sadao before onward distribution within the area.'