IRELAND\\\


Ferrymen touch the bottom


Richard Archer, Samskip’s general manager in Ireland, confirms the IMDO report that container traffic remained disappointing


in the second


quarter. While Irish exporters continue to suffer from weak European demand, the bigger issue is that imports are still shrinking. Speaking ahead of


Ireland’s October budget, Archer said


much depended on whether the government had scope to stimulate the economy. Meanwhile, he said, “We’re just trying to hold on to what we’ve got.” Samskip connects Dublin,


Waterford, Cork and Belfast each twice a week with Rotterdam with a “milk run” service that enables containers to be repositioned from


Issue 7 2013 - FBJ


21 Consumer caution dampens imports


Dublin to Cork, thus tapping into exports from the south of Ireland, but Archer complains that export rates to the Netherlands and Belgium are “ridiculous”. With


hauliers quitting the


business right across Europe, Samskip is trying to communicate the strength of its multimodal network. For example, the company is working to encourage


Polish exporters who currently truck to western Europe that it offers a competitive solution. “We’re not getting large volumes yet, but it’s growing,” Archer says. He believes Samskip’s new


Duisburg rail hub, from which there are barge connections to Rotterdam, also represents


a


convenient option to and from the heart of Europe.


Aſter a quiet start to the year, the ro- ro market is now starting to show some signs of recovery, says Alistair Eagles, MD of Seatruck Ferries. “For June to August, we saw


significant upliſt in the overall market compared with last year, and July was 9% ahead of July 2012,” Eagles says. “This year we can expect growth of 2.5% in the ro-ro market, though that is partly a reflection of last year being so awful. We can expect sustained growth of 1% to 1.5%.” Irish Sea ro-ro volumes were


1.57 million units in 2012, the same figure as in 2004 and around 11% down from the 1.76 million total in the peak year of 2007. Although this recent shrinkage underscores what a difficult five years it has been, Eagles points out: “We’ve not seen the massive drops experienced by the box trade.” Seatruck is now focusing routes, Warrenpoint-


on three


Heysham, Dublin-Heysham and Dublin-Liverpool. It ended a Belfast service aſter just three months in August 2012 aſter switching from Larne. “We had operated from Larne since 2010 and thought Belfast would produce more support, but it didn’t,” Eagles admits. “However, some of the traffic migrated to Warrenpoint [a long- term Seatruck base] and we think the Warrenpoint service could have its best ever year.” Ironically, Seatruck is itself now


operating none of the “Heysham max” vessels that


it ordered in


March 2008, just as the market started to go into reverse, on the Heysham route. Two, Seatruck Progress and Seatruck Power, have been switched to Dublin- Liverpool where their 2,166 lane metre capacity is more effectively deployed. The other pair are on long-term


charter to Stena Line and are operating on the Belfast-Heysham


route, now as Stena Performer and Stena Precision. Seatruck is operating the smaller Panorama and Arrow, which Eagles says “fit the current market better”, on the Warrenpoint-Heysham route. In the year to July, excluding


data from the defunct Larne and Belfast routes, Seatruck saw a 3.9% increase in volumes while the Irish Sea market as a whole was +2.4%. “Business is stronger than we have seen for a number of years, and the business is fairly well balanced in both directions. Frankly we, the hauliers and the whole industry needed it,” Eagles says. “We had to increase our base


prices in the first quarter - we had to increase rates to stay in business, although I do understand the trouble hauliers are having in passing that on to the end user. Door-to-door haulage rates have to increase, as they’re well below where they were five years ago.” Seatruck’s fleet is freight-only


and Eagles says: “I still have the core belief that unaccompanied is the future. The market is 44% driver- accompanied today. It has nudged down from over 50% in the last five to 10 years and in some ways I’m surprised it is still as high as it is. I see further growth in our volumes as the English ports involve so much less mileage than the Scottish routes.”


An unexpected side-effect of


the UK’s rush to generate more power from wind is that ferries on the longer Irish Sea routes will have to navigate round wind farms in future, adding to journey times. However, hauliers picking up


from Heysham or delivering trailers can expect to see a landside benefit from 2015 if a new link road to the M6 motorway gets the expected planning approval. The improved route will avoid a “torturous five or six-mile journey through central Lancaster,” Eagles says.


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