Vessels arrive empty at Singapore port

Vessel arrivals in 2009 may have risen by 10.1 per cent increase from 2008, but these vessels are coming in increasingly emptier.

According to figures from the Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore, vessel arrivals in terms of shipping tonnage and containers handled increased to 1.78 billion tonnes for 2009 from 1.62 billion tonnes in 2008. Container ships and tankers were the top contributors, accounting for 31.4 per cent and 29.6 per cent of the total vessel arrival tonnage respectively.

However, container traffic in 2009 has fallen by 13.5 percent from 2008, totalling 25.9 million Twenty-Foot Equivalent Units (TEUs) as compared to 29.9 million TEUs in 2008. Total cargo tonnage dipped correspondingly to 469.6 million tones, an 8.9% reduction.

The total volume of bunkers sold in the Port of Singapore also grew 4.2 per cent to reach 36.4 million tonnes, compared to 34.9 million tonnes in 2008. According to a Reuters report, this is largely due to an influx of larger vehicles entering Singapore due to the country having the lowest bunker prices in the region.

The number of ships registered also grew by 4.4 per cent or 1.9 million gross tons. The total tonnage of ships under the Singapore flag was 45.6 million gross tons as of end December 2009.