The spike in rates is driven by a sharp reduction in effective supply, caused by congestion Average container schedule delays have doubled globally, and increased by six times on the Far East and North America trade from two days in the first quarter 2020 to 12 days in the last quarter of 2021 (Exhibit 1). Shippers that managed to find access to the constrained capacity have experienced record low reliability both at sea and on land. Shippers have struggled to locate capacity, with acute shortages of vessel space, container boxes, chassis, warehouse space, intermodal capacity, and labor. 1 Shanghai Containerized Freight Index (SCFI) and China Containerized Freight Index (CCFI) data sourced through Clarksons Research’s Shipping Intelligence Network (SIN),. Global container shipping rates have, on average, increased to four to five times their 2019 levels while some spot markets have seen even higher rates.
COVID-19 led to a boom in US containerized consumer goods demand, causing congestion, and reducing effective container logistics capacity. Global supply chains have seen unprecedented disruption, and container freight rates are at record highs.
