Maersk: Change not made to avoid L.A.

Maersk: Change not made to avoid L.A.       Maersk Line said Wednesday a decision to adjust U.S. calls of several transpacific services is unlikely to result in any notable shift of the Danish carrier’s cargo away from Southern California ports.
      Changes to the carrier’s TP-1, TP-9, and TP-6 strings were announced last year and are due to come into effect in about a month.
      'There is no real attempt to move cargo away from Los Angeles or a fundamental change,' said Vincent Clerc, vice president of transpacific service for Maersk Line. 'We had an opportunity to rejig our network in a way that we could improve our product into the Pacific Northwest, and by doing that we are swapping strings.'
      The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday that Maersk's rotation changes were an example of how the Port of Los Angeles 'is coming under pressure as volumes drop,' and how regulations, such environmental restrictions, were making the port 'vulnerable to losing market share.'

Clerc

      Starting in about a month, the carrier's TP-1 service will call Los Angeles and Oakland instead of Tacoma and Oakland, the TP-9 service will call Seattle and Vancouver instead of Los Angeles, and the TP-6 will call Los Angeles exclusively, instead of calling both Los Angeles and Vancouver.
      Clerc said the changes will improve service to Vancouver — 'that's really what prompted this — there is a little difference in allocation, but it has more to do with our product into Vancouver is going to be better and we are going to need more space and the market into Los Angeles is not as good as it used to be. It really is a minor adjustment.'
      Will more cargo to the Midwest move through the Pacific Northwest than Southern California? 'There may be a few hundred TEU here and there, but that is more a function of what day you call the port in Asia, and what day you can have your cargo available than a change on our side on how we serve the Midwest,' Clerc said.
      Speaking generally about the transpacific trade outlook, Clerc said, 'we recognize rates have moved to unsustainable levels,'    echoing remarks made last week by the Transpacific Stabilization Agreement, a discussion agreement among 14 transpacific carriers that does not include Maersk.
      Maersk has about a 10.5 percent share of the transpacific market, Clerc said.
      'There is a lot of volatility in the market. Everybody is concerned about the state of the economy. The customers are concerned because they don't know what kind of volumes they are going to move, because they don't know how much the American consumer is going to buy,' he said.
      'Market sentiment has been contaminated by some of the other trades that saw rates dive earlier, whether it be Far/East Asia or Far East/Oceania,' he said.
      'Rates are at an unsustainable level. We don't really know what is ahead of us in terms of us. But eventually rates will have to go up, but it is difficult for me to know whether we will be able to achieve this in the coming weeks or months, but it clearly can not stay there for a very long time.' ' Chris Dupin