As one of the main ship types, containerships have gone through ups and downs in recent years. At present, the prevalence of large boxships has gradually squeezed the 5,000-7,999 TEUs out of the market. Since the beginning of 2007, containerships over 8,000 TEU have begun to prevail among shipowners. The biggest line Mearsk even orders ten 18,000 TEUs at Korean shipyard Daewoo at $18.4bn in this year.
However, those mega containerships could only sail on Asia-Europe routes and anchor at few ports due to its big size. Large-scale could not be everything, feeder containerships are also requisite for its uniqueness.
Compared with large boxships, feeder is more flexible for its capability to meet diversified and multi-level needs.
Generally, feeders are used for short international shipping, domestic coastal shipping, sub-line transportion and part of the main route transportation. Feeder fleet is essential in the respect of reducing large containerships’ anchoring frequency, sailing period, port investment and expenditure as well as guaranteeing sufficient supply on the main routes.
In the current feeder market, containerships of 3,000-5,000 TEU are still popular for its flexibility. However, the most potential vessels are those of 1,000-3,000 TEU.
Orders for feeder containerships are not abundant at hand currently. In 2011, Graig Group ordered 26 containerships of 2,000TEU with Zhoushan-based Jinhai Heavy Industry at a cost of $30m. In addition, Shandong-based Shenfei Shipbuilding secured an order for two 724TEUs from Iceland Eimskip. Feeder prices in this year witness mild increase even in the overall sluggish shipbuilding market, demonstrating its brilliant outlook.
One of the outstanding feeder containership builder in China is Jiangsu Shuntian Shipbuilding with an excellent orderbook of 3,500-TEU feeders.
On one hand, the increase of large containership orders has gradually pushes the ship type transposition on different routes. With containerships over 8,000TEU shifting to main routes, 10,000 TEUs and larger ones sailing on Asia-Europe lines, the original vessels on these routes were transferred to Pan-Pacific routes. All this make feeder containerships shift to regional trading routes.
On the other hand, boxship large-scale is likely to lead to oversupply of mega vessels and the shortage of feeders, which would further result in intense competition for feeder new orders.
On the basis of keeping the advantage in feeder building, Chinese shipyards should further enhance its technology to upgrade ship type. Furthermore, to seize and fully meet market demand is the only to remain invincible in the competition.