DENMARK's Maersk Line says it is making "major changes" to its Asia-North Europe container shipping network starting in April.

    The carrier expects the changes to be in place by June 2011, in a move designed to improve port coverage and service reliability between the major markets in the trade.

    "The network will feature multiple calls from Ningbo, Shanghai, [Shenzhen-]Yantian, Tanjung Pelepas plus direct coverage of Japan, Korea and other Chinese ports into Europe. Southeast Asian ports will continue to be served via our transshipment hub of Tanjung Pelepas," said a company statement.

    Said vice president Vincent Clerc: "Our customers have clearly requested more reliable services and better end-to-end connections so we have built such improvements into this network design."

    The shipping line said the first westbound change will affect its AE10 service from Ningbo on April 7, continuing into Shanghai, Shenzhen-Yantian and Tanjung Pelepas. Its other strings will also follow a similar rotation through Asia, with direct calls to ports in Japan, South Korea and China, namely Xiamen, Hong Kong and Guangzhou-Nansha.

    The carrier plans to continue to offer direct calls at Felixstowe, Rotterdam , Bremerhaven, Hamburg, Le Havre, Zeebrugge, Antwerp, Gdansk, Aarhus and Gothenburg. Eastbound changes will start from Gdansk on May 13, proceeding through northern European ports and into south China, said the statement.

(Source:http://www.schednet.com)