Ships diverted from UK due to port saturation. Europe up to date | dw

Several giant container ships, loaded with goods to sell during Christmas, were redirected to European ports this Tuesday (10.12.2021) after not being able to disembark at British ports due to traffic jams caused by the pandemic and Brexit Was.

“To ensure that merchandise will be widely available in the UK for Black Friday and Christmas, we have started calling one of our three large ships to Felixstow every week,” said on Tuesday, in the east of England. A spokesperson for Maersk, the world’s largest container shipping company, told AFP.

According to him, the saturation of unloading docks is linked to a shortage of truck drivers, a country plagued by Brexit and the pandemic, which is causing serious supply problems in supermarkets and gas stations.

To solve the problem, some ships unload cargo in European ports such as Rotterdam (Netherlands) or Antwerp (Belgium), where it is transported by smaller ships bound for Felixstow, he said.

The head of Maersk’s East-West Maritime Network, Lars Mikael Jensen, argued that “it is better to send a ship to another port than to wait for a ship outside Felixstow for four, five or six days to find a place to dock. “

The group’s spokesperson indicated that port congestion is world-wide, but this British port, through which 36 percent of the volume of sea freight in the United Kingdom passes, is “one of the 3rd or 4th most difficult ports in the world. World. “.

According to him, the reason is that “empty containers are not removed at normal speed due to the lack of truck drivers” due to Brexit and the pandemic.

A shortage of 100,000 drivers and fears of a widespread Christmas shortage prompted the British government to review its immigration policy and agree to 10,500 provisional work visas.

(AFP)