2M Alliance members Maersk Line and Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC) have added a port call in Nansha - in southern China's Guangdong province - to its US east coast service via the Suez Canal to New York, Charleston, Savannah, Miami and Freeport, Bahamas.

The service, branded TP17 by Maersk and America by MSC, adds to Nansha's four weekly services to the US west coast and 50 global services, reported IHS Media.

International container volume through Nansha in the first half of the year surged by 19.6 per cent to 3.8 million TEU, according to port statistics. Total container throughput through Nansha, which accounts for three-quarters of container volume flowing through Guangzhou city, grew by 5.8 per cent to 15.57 million TEU between 2017 and 2018.

Since late 2017, government incentives have helped the port of Guangzhou - close to export-focused factories and an expanding local population - grow its share of volume through the Greater Bay Area of Shenzhen, according to Drewry's fourth-quarter analysis of the shipping market.

"The west side of the Pearl River is less congested than the Shenzhen ports over on the east side, and its clear advantage over Hong Kong is that it averts the need for an expensive cross-border truck haul," Drewry was cited as saying in the report.

Compared with the 7.6 per cent growth of Guangzhou, the fifth-busiest port with 21.92 million TEU, container traffic through Hong Kong declined 5.6 per cent to 19.6 million TEU in 2018, according to JOC rankings. Last year, total volume through Shenzhen increased by 2.1 per cent to 25.73 million TEU.

http://www.shippingazette.com/menu.asp?encode=eng