DIRECT SERVICE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23108, 6 February 1937, Page 14

DIRECT SERVICE

DOMINION AND EAST INDIES ENTERPRISE OF DUTCH LINE Messrs Dalgety and Co., Ltd., report having received cable advice from their principals, the Royal Packet Navigation Company, Ltd., of Sydney, advising the inauguration of a monthly direct service between Auckland, Wellington and Java main ports, with transhipment services to all Netherland Indies outports and Singapore with transhipment services to Malayan outports. Each alternate sailing will give direct discharge at Saigon. The first vessel scheduled is the Van Rees, which will leave Singapore for Batavia, Semarang, Sourabaya, Port Moresby, and Auckland, at which port she is due to arrive on May 6. She will then proceed on May 8 for Wellington, where she will arrive on May 10 and depart the next day for Sydney, Port Moresby, Sourabaya, Semarang, Batavia and Singapore. The new motor vessel Maetsuycker, which is almost completed, is scheduled to take up the running from Saigon for Singapore, Batavia, Semarang, Sourabaya, Port Moresby, Samarai, Raboul, Port Vila, Noumea. She will arrive at Auckland on June 8. departing for Wellington the next day, and will sail on June 12 for Sydney, Port Moresby, Sourabaya, Semarang, Batavia, Singapore and Saigon. This direct service will fill a muchneeded want and, it is considered, will create facilities of great value to New Zealand in the promotion of trade between the Dominion and the Dutch East Indies, Singapore and the surrounding territories. One of the world's great shipping companies, the K.P.M. Line, has a fleet of some 130 steamers and motor ships, and maintains a network of sailings from the Dutch East Indies to most ports of the world. The extension of a direct service to New Zealand had been contemplated for some time. The company is noted for its progressive outlook and sound management, an outstanding example of its activities being the fast aeroplane service which it has for a number of years maintained between Holland and Batavia, one of the earliest and most successful of the world's now rapidly growing air services. Two of the largest ships in the K.P.M. fleet are the luxurious motor liners Nieuw Zeeland and Nieuw Holland, of 11,000 tons gross, which maintain the company's passenger service from Singapore to Australia. The Van Rees, for the New Zealand service, is a steamer of 3050 tons gross, built in Rotterdam in 1913. The motor ship Maetsuycker, now nearing completion in Holland, is a vessel of about 4000 tons gross register. It is understood that she will be fitted with refrigerated space for the export trade from New Zealand to the East. At present the Van Rees has no refrigerated space, but it is believed that in the near future she also will be fitted for the carriage of refrigerated cargoes.