Archives



Freight News, Sea


M2 less worrying than P3, say European shippers

[ July 11, 2014   //   ]

The European Shippers’ Council (ESC) described the proposed M2 vessel sharing agreement between MSC and Maersk on the East-West trades as “less worrying for shippers than the now cancelled P3 consortium between MSC, Maersk and CMA CGM. Ot pointed out, however, that the two carriers would have a market share of around 35% between Asia and Europe – a high enough threshold to be of interest to the competition authorities.

There should be monitoring of capacity modification and its impact on rates and a centralized notification system should be created to ensure that shippers get service modifications (including transit time and port calls) far enough in advance.

ESC said it would also carefully monitor the M2 agreement’s effect on rates, ports called and quality of services and would continue to advocate a deeper involvement by EU competition watchdogs.

Tags: , , , , ,