MOL SEES END OF DOWNWARDS TREND IN TRANSPACIFIC MARKET

MOL SEES END OF DOWNWARDS TREND IN TRANSPACIFIC MARKET    The trend of decreasing cargo volumes in the eastbound transpacific trade may have finally come to an end, according to the shipping research arm of Japan’s Mitsui O.S.K. Lines.
   In December, eastbound cargo volumes rose by 4.7 percent, when compared to December 2000, it reported. This increase broke a cycle of monthly volume decreases of 1 percent in October 2001 and 2.4 percent in November 2001.
   “It seems that the downward trend of eastbound cargo movement, as far as the monthly year-on-year comparison is concerned, stopped at the end of 2001,” MOL’s shipping research department said.
   It also reported that the drop in eastbound traffic volumes following the Sept. 11 attacks was not as deep as expected.
   By contrast, westbound transpacific cargo volumes continued to decrease in December, MOL said.
   For the year 2001, eastbound cargo volume totaled 7.2 million TEUs, up by 1.2 percent over 2000 traffic levels, and westbound traffic was 3.2 million TEUs, down by 0.3 percent.
   The Japanese line reported that the countries with the largest percentage increases in eastbound transpacific volumes in December were Vietnam (up 56 percent) and Thailand (up 10 percent). The countries that had the steepest falls in eastbound cargo traffic were Singapore (down 15 percent) and Taiwan (down 8 percent). Westbound, traffic volumes in December rose to Vietnam (up 102 percent) and China/Hong Kong (up 7 percent), but decreased the most to Singapore (down 20 percent) and Indonesia (down 18 percent).