Hapag-Lloyd: Container shortage will remain a challenge in the coming months

One box is hard to find, and there will be a severe shortage of containers for several months. Before that, Maersk, the world's largest container shipping company, admitted that due to the booming Pacific market, there has been a shortage of containers in the market for several months, especially the 40-foot-long large containers. .

Currently, there are not enough empty containers to meet freight demand. The shipping company Hapag-Lloyd said the problem of obtaining enough empty containers will continue for several months. At present, more than 70% of the containers in the world contain cargo.

▲Hapag-Lloyd predicts that container supply will remain a challenge in the coming months

According to Hapag-Lloyd, there seems to be no indication that this situation will change.

"We believe that managing the availability of containers will remain a challenge in the coming months."

The shipping company said, especially those frequently used 40-foot containers, the current demand is increasing, and the supply is in short supply.

Hapag-Lloyd believes that the shortage of containers is mainly related to the global container fleet reaching a new level. More specifically, currently 70% of the world’s containers are loading goods or are transporting goods.

Hapag-Lloyd wrote: "This development has caused shortages in some places, and we have to relax business opportunities accordingly."

▍Re-allocate or order more containers

DHL initially raised the issue of providing enough containers for routes between Asia and Europe.

According to the logistics company, this is because the container liner company has redistributed many empty containers for deployment between China and North America. Due to the current high freight rates, each container is very profitable on these routes.

But Hapag-Lloyd has been working hard to solve the problem and redistribute the containers where they are most needed. However, this effort has been delayed because it takes 6 to 10 weeks for ships recovered from places such as the Far East to reach their destinations-carrying cargo and excess empty containers.

Due to the current shortage of containers, Hapag-Lloyd has further invested in new containers and leased containers to prepare for the reversal of the Covid-19 epidemic.