The surge in Sino-US trade has pushed up shipping prices, and the exports of Chinese foreign trade companies have stagnated!

Since the beginning of this year, global container shipping prices have been rising. On August 10, the Global Container Freight Index showed that the shipping price from China, Southeast Asia to the east coast of North America exceeded US$20,000 per TEU for the first time. On August 2, the figure was still $16,000.

According to industry insiders, in the past month, many major global shipping companies such as Maersk, Mediterranean, Hapag-Lloyd, etc., have successively increased or increased a number of surcharges in the name of peak season surcharges and destination port congestion charges. This is also the recent shipping price and the key to a sharp rise. In addition to the global container freight index, the latest Shanghai export container freight index was 4225.86, which also set a record high under the premise that the calculation caliber has not changed.

Not long ago, the Ministry of Transport of China also stated that with the spread of the global epidemic, serious congestion has continued to occur in ports in the United States, Europe and other places since the fourth quarter of 2020, which has caused chaos in the international logistics supply chain and reduced efficiency, resulting in a large area of ​​ship schedules. Delays have seriously affected operational efficiency. This year, the shortage of international shipping capacity and rising freight rates have become a global problem.

The sharp rise in shipping prices caused the exports of Chinese foreign trade companies to stagnate for a while.

Trade Increase

In July this year, China’s imports and exports of goods trade increased by 11.5% over the same period last year, and foreign trade continued to improve. However, the ever-rising freight rates and “a box is hard to find” have put China’s foreign trade companies under great pressure. With the increase in shipping prices, the sales pressure of foreign trade companies continues to increase.

A furniture factory in Guangdong Province said : Especially since June and July, our entire shipments have decreased by more than 40%. It turned out that I finished 3,000 sets, and finally only shipped more than 1,000 sets, and the remaining 1,000 sets are still in the warehouse. Because the freight is too expensive, customers will not pay, and now most of the customers’ orders have been suspended.

According to industry analysts, in the first seven months of this year, Sino-US trade reached 2.62 trillion yuan, an increase of 28.9% year-on-year, which was much higher than the overall increase in imports and exports. This has also become an important reason for the significant increase in shipping prices between China and the United States.

From January to April this year, the capacity of the China mainland to North American West route increased by 81% and 36% compared with the same period in 2020 and 2019, respectively, and the volume increased by 103% and 53% compared with the same period in 2020 and 2019, respectively. In July, Ningbo Zhoushan Port added 4 ocean-going routes again, and the total number of routes reached a record high. Yantian Port, which is dominated by European and American routes, also added 2 American routes.

(The above information comes from China Central Television)