Freight and bunker charges rise

Press, Volume CXIII, Issue 33417, 26 December 1973, Page 1

Freight and bunker charges rise

(Neto Zealand Press Association) AUCKLAND, December 25. Shippers will have to contend with more freight rate and bunker surcharge rises early in the New Year. The New Zealand Eastern Shipping Committee will introduce a 3.16 per cent bunker surcharge on January 1.

The surcharge will be imposed on shipping services from New’ Zealand to Japan, the Far East and South-East Asia. The committee says that further increases may become necessary.

The lines affected are the Crusader Shipping Company, Ltd, the Japan Line, Mitsui O.S.K. Lines, Royal Interocean Lines, and the China Navigation Company, Ltd. From January the five member shipping lines will quote their freight rates in New Zealand currency for the first time. The United States dollar has been used in the past. Shipping costs will also be affected by a decision of the United States Federal Maritime Commission, which has approved of an 8 per cent freight rate increase which

was applied for by lines trading between New Zealand and United States west coast ports. The new rate will be charged by two lines—the Pacific Far East Line and the Columbus Line, which have ships in this service. It will incorporate a 5.86 per cent currency adjustment which became effective on December 1 and will take effect with sailings from New Zealand in January.

The Pacific Far East Line has advised its customers to expect an additional bunker surcharge of about seven and

a half per cent of maximum present freight rates because of the dramatic increase in bunker costs during the last three months.

The only encouraging piece of news about freight rates has come from the New Zealand European Shipping Association and the Overseas Shipowners’ Committee who say they are able to increase the rebate on non-refrigerated cargo shipped on pallets to £1 a cubic metre.

The two organisations represent shipping lines in the New Zealand-Europe trade, and they say the rebate will also apply to non-refrigerated cargo shipped on pallets which are in turn loaded into containers.