Last year was a reasonably good one for the shipping industry overall, with some parts doing significantly better than others.
Major concerns include rising bunker costs, the slowing US economy, sub-prime woes and impending anti-monopolies regulations in Europe. While cargo growth and rates have been good on most trades, the sharp increase in bunker prices towards the second half of last year was an unexpected cost that container lines in particular struggled to recover from shippers. This year in general has been good. Cargo growth to Europe, the Middle East and Africa has been satisfactory. Cargo growth mainly contributed by China exports had supported a good market in containers for Europe and the US, as well as the North/South trades. In general, this was a good year after all. NOL was similarly pleased with last year's performance. 'Ongoing strength in the world economy, together with continuing outsourcing of global manufacturing production to Asia, drove double-digit growth in demand for international container shipping services in 2007.
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