GLOBAL – Sea-Intelligence, a renowned authority in global logistics research, has released its 149th edition of the Global Liner Performance (GLP) report, listing Maersk as the leading global carrier in schedule reliability for the year 2023 with a 67.7% range.

In the report, Maersk is followed by MSC (65.9%), CMA CGM (62.8%), Evergreen (61.9%), and Wan Hai (61.3%).

Moreover, all 13 global carriers recorded double-digit year-on-year improvements, with Wan Hai achieving the largest improvement of 27.4 percentage points.

Among the alliances, 2M proved the most reliable at 57.8%, outperforming Ocean Alliance (55.3%) and THE Alliance (43.1%).

While all alliances recorded double-digit year-on-year improvements, only 2M exceeded the industry average on the six major East/West trades.

Notably, the Asia-Mediterranean trade lane outscored the industry average on a trade lane level, showcasing positive trends amid the challenges faced by the industry.

Impact of the Red Sea crisis

Additionally, covering 34 trade lanes and over 60 carriers, the report sheds light on the impact of the Red Sea crisis on the industry.

December 2023 marked a significant 5.0% month-over-month decline in overall schedule reliability, plummeting to 56.8%, the second-lowest point in the year.

This drop, the most substantial since February 2021, was primarily attributed to the heightened transit times around Africa during the Red Sea crisis.

Alan Murphy, Managing Director of Sea-Intelligence, highlighted the unique challenges posed by the crisis: “Due to increased transit times around Africa, none of the top 13 carriers recorded a month-on-month improvement in schedule reliability, while only 4 carriers were able to record a year-on-year improvement.”

In this challenging landscape, Taiwanese container liner Evergreen emerged as the most reliable among the top 13 carriers in December 2023, boasting a schedule reliability of 63.6%.

France’s CMA CGM closely followed, with the two carriers being the only ones surpassing the 60% threshold.
However, six carriers fell within the 50%-60% range, and five carriers were in the 40%-50% range, with Taiwanese carrier Yang Ming being the least reliable at 45.6%.

The annual global schedule reliability, while showing a commendable improvement of 19.5 percentage points, reaching 62.1%, still only matched the levels of 2020 and remained below the 70%-80% range observed from 2012 to 2019.

Concerns were raised regarding the declining month-on-month trend in Q4, likely to persist into January 2024 due to the Red Sea Crisis.

Murphy added a note of optimism: “Once the additional transit time is accounted for in the carriers’ schedules, we will potentially see an improvement in schedule reliability.”

He emphasized that the crisis came too late to significantly impact average delays, which improved from 6.38 to 4.83 days in the fiscal year 2023.

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