The past thirty years has seen an explosion in global trade. Countries like China, along with other Asian countries like Vietnam and Bangladesh have taken over the role of being the shop floor for the world. With automation picking pace, we are looking at a further evolution in the way products are made and shipped. Shipping is thus an extremely vital component of global commerce today. In this article, we are going to look at a list of statistics and trends that have been taking shape in the shipping industry.
Market Share of Container Shipping
Containers seem like such an obvious choice for shipping goods. Yet, it was a long time before they became the standard way to ship goods. The total value of shipped goods in 2017 has been measured to be 12 trillion US dollars. According to Statista, container ships constitute around 60 percent of this overall value.
Growth In Container Shipping
In terms of tonnage, container shipping started low at around 102 million tons back in 1980. By 2016, this figure had jumped to over 1.72 billion tons. Here is how the growth happened according to Statista
1980 : 102 million tons
1985 : 152 million tons
1990 : 234 million tons
1995 : 371 million tons
2000 : 598 million tons
2005 : 1001 million tons
2010 : 1280 million tons
2015 : 1661 million tons
As you can see, the tonnage roughly doubles every ten years.
Growth In Container Shipping Capacity
The container shipping capacity is calculated in terms of deadweight. Deadweight is essentially the total weight a ship can carry. This is not including the weight of the ship itelf but is inclusive of all cargo, fuel, fresh water, ballast water, passengers and crew. This is how the container shipping industry has grown over the years in terms of deadweight according to Statista.
1980 : 11 million dwt
1985 : 20 million dwt
1990 : 26 million dwt
1995 : 44 million dwt
2000 : 64 million dwt
2005 : 98 million dwt
2010 : 169 million dwt
2015 : 228 million dwt.
By the latest count, the the total container shipping capacity had already risen to 246 million dwt by the end of 2017.
Top Exporting Countries of Container Cargo Shipping
China is undoubtedly the biggest exporter of containerized cargo in the world. This is followed by the United States, South Korea and Japan. In all, the world shipped 127.60 million fully loaded TEU (twenty foot equivalent) containers in the year 2014 which is the latest data that is available on WorldShipping. Here is a top fifteen list of the largest countries for containerized cargo shipping (for 2014).
China : 36 million TEUS
USA : 11.9 million TEUS
S. Korea : 5.93 million TEUS
Japan : 5.28 million TEUS
Indonesia: 4 million TEUS
Thailand : 3.92 million TEUS
Germany : 3.32 million TEUS
Taiwan : 3.25 million TEUS
India : 3.07 million TEUS
Vietnam : 2.94 million TEUS
Brazil : 2.88 million TEUS
Malaysia : 2.60 million TEUS
KSA : 2.24 million TEUS
Italy : 1.83 million TEUS
Turkey : 1.82 million TEUS
