Maersk Broker Names Africa Container Bright Spot for 2023
By Obiabin Onukwugha
Maersk Broker has named Africa bright spot for container shipping in in 2023. The agency in a report, stated that shipping activities grew in Africa despite 2023 being a challenging year for the industry. It said experts believe Africa will experience more growth in the coming years by the creation of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA).
It was gathered that containerised imports into Africa in the first seven months of this year grew by 10.1% in comparison to the same period in 2019.
Reports say of all the trade lanes tracked by UK consultancy Maritime Strategies International (MSI), it is the Asia to Africa route that has experienced the strongest growth this year.
Maersk Broker said, the main driver of this increase has been the trade from Asia into the African west coast.
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“The trade volume on this tradelande has grown by 20.9% compared to last year. Volumes from the Middle East and South America into West Africa have also contributed to the increase.
“Such growth trends are also visible in the deployment on the Asia -West Africa trade, where the deployed tonnage in October this year has grown by 22.3% in leu terms compared to the same period of 2022.
“Since most parts of Africa are experiencing rapid urbanisation, we expect the demand for building materials, electronics, furniture and other containerised goods to continue increasing,” the Maersk Broker data revealed.
Also, data from Container Trade Statistics, indicated that the Asia-Africa market is the strongest growing ex-Asia market in 2023, having seen August 2023 year-to-date, year-on-year volume growth of 19.6%, which is far better than the global contraction of -3.3%.
The latest data from CTS shows that Far East to Africa has grown 15% since 2019 which equals 3.5% average annual growth, Jensen pointed out.
The Asia-Africa trade accounts for 3.2% of the global deepsea volumes in 2023 year-to-date, compared to the 17.9% market share of Asia-North America or 14.7% of Asia-Europe.
