Can't afford it! The freight rate is still high and the foreign trade enterprises are doing eve

A relevant person in charge of a mobile e-commerce platform said: "After the price of sea freight has risen, we have to adjust the selling price of goods, otherwise we will lose money."

He also revealed: "Most of our goods are shipped abroad by sea, and a very small part is shipped by air and land. If the price of sea transportation does not come down, it will be difficult to break the situation of increasing revenue without increasing profits in the future."

Although some companies choose air freight and European trains, for foreign trade companies, they still prefer shipping.

It is reported that some small foreign trade cargo owners have adopted the method of consolidation and consolidation to save costs, while large cargo owners and agents have thought of the method of chartering ships. However, the high costs brought about by rising freight rates make foreign trade companies face meager profits or even losses.

A board secretary of an A-share listed trading company said: "The most cost-effective way is sea transportation. A single ship can transport tens of thousands of tons of containers. Due to the congestion of overseas ports, the uncertainty of the return time has increased, so we have launched European trains. However, the quantity of goods shipped in this way is limited, and there is no more imported goods to load on the return journey, so the cost of one trip is still relatively high.”

The person also said: "Some orders from Europe and the United States will not increase in price because of the increase in freight rates. Even if we don't accept them, many foreign trade companies in Southeast Asia can accept them. In order to save costs, we can only go to Southeast Asian countries with cheap labor to open factories. Appropriately hedge some of the costs.”

Freight rates skyrocketed, and many countries intervened

In the face of skyrocketing freight rates, many countries have begun to take measures to intervene.

In September 2021, maritime regulators from China, the US and the EU convened a Global Shipping Regulation Summit. FMC Chairman Daniel Maffei talked about "the unusually high operation of ocean freight and container prices" at the meeting.

At the same time, in order to solve the problem of lack of containers and space for foreign trade enterprises, a large number of container enterprises have begun to expand production, and shipping companies have also greatly increased their transportation capacity, and have placed orders for new ships.

According to statistics from Clarksons, from January to October 2021, a total of 110.08 million DWT of new ship orders were traded worldwide, a year-on-year increase of 156.1%.

However, the expansion of containers and ships has also raised concerns among industry insiders about whether the new capacity will cause overcapacity.
A shipping source said: "The port has been in a state of congestion for a long time, and the failure of ship turnover is an important reason for the imbalance in the supply chain of this round of container shipping. once the supply chain is restored, container manufacturers and shipping companies will consider issues such as excess capacity."