SIMIC

In its latest issue of the Global Liner Performance (GLP) report, global schedule reliability dropped to 44.6 per cent in December 2020. Compared to December 2019, schedule reliability is -31.7 percentage points lower, and is the fifth consecutive month that we have recorded a double-digit year-on-year decline.

"We also see a similar trend with the average delay for late vessel arrivals, which has recorded consecutive month-on-month increases for the past four months, reaching 5.74 days in December," said Alan Murphy, CEO, Sea-Intelligence.

In December 2020, Hamburg Sud was the most reliable carrier with 55.3 per cent schedule reliability, but a significant deterioration when compared to December 2019.

"Only HMM and ZIM recorded a month-on-month improvement in schedule reliability, whereas none of the carriers recorded a year-on-year improvement in schedule reliability, with Maersk Line recording the smallest decline of a still-staggering -27.5 percentage points," said Mr Murphy.

"This slump in schedule reliability coincided with the carriers' introduction of capacity on the major trade lanes, above and beyond what we have seen before. With continued widespread port congestion, and with carriers still not letting off capacity-wise (especially on the major trades) not even for Chinese New Year, shippers might not see improving schedule reliability until 2021-Q2."