GRAND ALLIANCE TO ADD 6TH ASIA/NORTH EUROPE STRING

GRAND ALLIANCE TO ADD 6TH ASIA/NORTH EUROPE STRING    The Grand Alliance of Hapag-Lloyd, Malaysia International Shipping Corp., NYK, Orient Overseas Container Line and P&O Nedlloyd will introduce a sixth weekly service between Asia and northern Europe.
   Gunther Casjens, chief executive officer of Hapag-Lloyd Container Line, said the sixth service will be launched in the middle of 2001. The five existing services will be restructured at that time, he added.
   New vessels of about 7,000 TEUs will join the Grand Alliance's Asia/Europe services starting in the fall of 2001, while ships of 4,800-TEU capacity will be switched to the group’s Asia/North America/Europe/North America Asia “Pacific Atlantic Express” service, he added.
   The Grand Alliance is already the largest carrier group in the Asia/Europe/Mediterranean trade. According to World Liner Supply, a reporting service of the global shipping database ComPairData, the Grand Alliance deploys a one-way container capacity of 1.5 million TEUs a year, representing 23 percent of the total trade capacity.