Ocean carrier alliances are preparing to blank more than a third of their sailings from Asia over the coming weeks in response to a reduction in export freight, according to the latest report from Project44.

The blanking strategies by the alliances to mitigate the impact of the Covid lockdowns will further extend cargo lead times, particularly to North Europe.

Project44 platform’s data shows that between weeks 17 to 23, THE Alliance will blank 33% of its scheduled sailings from Asia, the Ocean Alliance will void 37%, while the 2M alliance will cancel 39% of its head-haul voyages.

Maersk said that，the unprecedented situation of severe port congestion globally continues to result in accumulation of delays across several services on the Asia to Med network. This situation is driven by a combination of increased demand and measures to fight the pandemic across ports and supply chains in general. These accumulated delays are currently causing further gaps in the schedules and have resulted in several Asia departures been spread apart by more than 7 days.Maersk has decided to adjust the voyages to match with corresponding the vessels and services.

Due to the current challenging market situation impacting port activities and generating congestion across the supply chain, MSC is planning to adjust the sailing programme on its Asia to the Mediterranean network to match the actual departure dates from Asia.

Project44 said that, after previously lagging the other two alliances in terms of void sailings, “the 2M will blank more sailings than any other alliance in the coming weeks”.

In regard to port congestion, Project44 data revealed that import dwell time at the port of Shanghai peaked at nearly 16 days at the end of April, while export dwell times remained “relatively stable, at around three days”.It explained: “The inflated import dwell time is due to a shortage of truckers to haul out offloaded containers. In the same vein, a drastic reduction in export freight to the port has meant fewer containers can be shipped out of Shanghai, mellowing export dwell times.”

Meanwhile, as a consequence of the export cargo disruptions in China and the resulting cancellations of sailings, cargo lead times from Asia to North Europe continue to grow, Project44 data shows lead times from China to North Europe and the UK have increased by 20% and 27%, respectively, in the past 12 months.

Hapag-Lloyd recently announced the vessel schedule between Asia and the Mediterranean with its MD1, MD2 and MD3 services, will omit Shanghai and Ningbo port in the next five weeks.