FEFC carriers post modest April westbound growth

Ocean carriers in the Far Eastern Freight Conference last month carried an extra 5.6 percent containers in the westbound Asia to Europe/Mediterranean trade.

The FEFC said today its members?April westbound box volume was 813,098 TEUs, up from 770,315 TEUs in the same month last year.

Broken down by region, the monthly Far East-to-North Europe volume was up 5 percent to 520,258 TEUs, while the westbound trade to Mediterranean ports improved 6.5 percent to 292,840 TEUs.

After four months of 2008, the FEFC members?westbound volume was up 10 percent to 3.18 million TEUs.

Eastbound figures for April are not available yet, but the FEFC did report March抯 backhaul volume as being down 3.5 percent at 322,356 TEUs, and down 3.8 percent for the first quarter at 865,990 TEUs. 

Source: American Shipper