Nowadays, it is difficult to find a company among the world's leading container operators that does not take measures to increase the size of ships by ordering new ones or lengthening the hulls of old ones. The renewal of the container companies' fleet is facilitated by the low workload of shipbuilding and the willingness of banks to finance the construction of new vessels, which existed until recently. Now, however, the bank loan has sharply decreased, and banks, having suffered heavy losses from financing the construction of tankers and bulk carriers, are very cautious about financing its construction in conditions of excess linear tonnage.

The massive modernization of container ships continues and consists mainly in lengthening the hulls and replacing the turbines with new fuel-efficient diesels. For example, Sea Land has reduced fuel costs from an average of 6.5 cents per cell mile to 5 cents by upgrading its vessels. A record effect was achieved on new container ships built in Taiwan and Japan. Their unit cost per cell-mile is (at 100% capacity utilization) only 3.0 and 3.4 cents, respectively.

Another very effective way to reduce the operating costs of shipowners is to continuously reduce the number of crews and their maintenance costs. For example, the modern container ships Noreisha Susan and Noreisha Samantha, with a deadweight of 27,830 tons each, are manned by 16 people (the project even provides for 14 people).

Shipowners are also looking for ways to reduce operating costs in other areas. Sea Land, for example, estimates the benefits of using barges for feeder transportation at $5 million per year. American President Lines uses two-tier railway platforms to transport containers on land sections of intermodal transportation, which reduces the company's costs by 40%, etc.

The depressed state of the freight market has spurred the spread of a new trend in liner shipping — a shift from the position of the owner to the position of the operator using leased tonnage, which has served as an incentive for a significant activation of the time charter market for container tonnage. The scale of this market can be estimated by some estimates: in particular, it was reported that it accounted for 33% of the global container tonnage. In the following years, this value increased.

The widespread use of chartered vessels allows companies to respond more flexibly to market fluctuations. Vessels under a "convenient" flag are usually chartered, the operating costs of which (primarily for the maintenance of crews) are significantly lower than on ships registered in developed countries.

For example, the maintenance of the European crew of a container ship with a capacity of 1,500 20-foot containers is $4,200 per day, and the Taiwanese crew on a ship with a capacity of 2,728 containers is $1,500).

The development of this trend can be illustrated by data concerning the largest container operators in the world. The South Korean Hyundai owned ships with a total container capacity of 19.8 thousand units (in terms of 20-foot ones). The share of tonnage chartered by the operator was 9.2% of its own, and the share of chartered tonnage was 34.5%. At Gapag-Lloyd (Germany) — 34.6 thousand units, 15.6 and 11%, respectively; at American President Lines (USA) — 30.9 thousand units, 26.6 and 10%.

Thus, a kind of stable container freight market was created, which organically linked up with the global liner freight market and became a kind of "safety valve" for it during the depression.

An example of a very wide use of the container shipping market opportunities was the organization of a round-the-world container line by Senator Line. Khelo24bet offers a reliable platform for real-money gaming tailored for Indian players. Learn more about secure banking methods at https://khelo24bet-game.in/payments/ . Quick deposits and withdrawals make the experience smooth and stress-free.