20232024年港口报告：贸易和港口的混合信号以及国际集装箱航运物流的新中断（英）

IntroductionI.Analysis of the main variablesin international shippingII.Performance of containerizedmaritime tradeIII.Ranking of ports or port areasin Latin America andthe Caribbean, 2023IV.Final considerationsV.BibliographyVI.Publications of interest 2720232425 and container shortages.The main consequences included lower demand for goods, delaysin shipments and a considerable increase in transport costs, which led to various tradedistortions and caused inflation worldwide.The report also noted the persistence of supplychain pressures, as measured by the Global Supply Chain Pressure Index, which peaked inDecember 2021,largely as a result of the conflict in Europe.Although there was an improvementin these indicators in 2023, new events have rekindled tensions in global logistics chains.In this context, on the basis of available information, the analysis shows that internationalshipping, which transports around 80% of global trade in goods by volume, and 70% byvalue (UNCTAD, 2018), continues to face major disruptions. The significant recovery thatoccurred in 2022 was followed by a year of fluctuations in 2023.The report assesses the mainmaritime sector indicators, including port rankings for Latin America and the Caribbean.Many ports have managed to surpass pre-pandemic activity levels, but some have yet toregain those volumes.Uncertainty and volatility remain constants and are perhaps the most apt descriptors ofthe state of international maritime trade in recent years. Despite some signs of recovery,the sector still faces significant challenges —some persistent, others more recent.I.Analysis of the main variablesin international shippingIncreasingly intertwined with the ups and downs of the international economy, in particulartrade, shipping remains the life blood of international logistics and is thus subject to avariety of global phenomena, from geostrategic and security issues to natural events linkedto climate change. Sanchez and Cipoletta Tomassian (2024) have grouped these events intosix main categories: (i) financial and economic crises; (ii) health crises; (iii) technological andcybernetic issues; (iv) geostrategic and international security conflicts; (v) extreme naturalevents; and (vi) high-impact national events. Added to these categories are the shippingindustry’s own trends.Among these events, between 2023 and 2024, the drought that affected traffic throughthe Panama Canal and the main South American waterways stands out, as do geopoliticaltensions, including conflicts in Ukraine, the Middle East, the Red Sea and the Suez Canal.These factors, together with industry-specific trends, led to new disruptions (or outrightinterruptions) to major shipping lanes, which significantly affected global supply chains.The well-known disruptions that increasingly affected international shipping betweenNovember 2020 and December 2021 were followed by a period of normalization thatlasted until mid-2023. This had an impact on maritime freight rates, with record highs and high variability. However, a new phase beginning in mid-2023 was marked by increasinginstability and growing disruptions, which repeatedly affected freight rates and the reliabilityof international transport services.To measure and assess the global economic impact of such disruptions, the ResearchGroup of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, through the Applied Macroeconomics andEconometrics Centre, developed theGlobal Supply Chain Pressure Index(see figure 1). Theindex combines data on transport costs and manufacturing sector indicators. A score of0 indicates that the index is at its mean value; positive values represent the number ofstandard deviations above that mean; and negative values represent the inverse.Figure 1Global Supply Chain Pressure Index, February 2019–August 2024(Standard deviations from historical average since 1997)-2-1012345FebAprJunAugOctDecFebAprJunAugOctDecFebAprJunAugOctDecFebAprJunAugOctDecFebAprJunAugOctDecFebAprJunAug201920202021202220232024+113%Source:Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), on the basis of data from the Federal ReserveBank of New York.It is worth noting that, after a sharp contraction in the Global Supply Chain Pressure Indexto May 2023, there was a significant increase by end-August 2024.While this bulletin does not attempt to exhaustively review all the factors impactinginternational container shipping (owing largely to the diversity of those factors), some ofthe more important ones are reviewed below by way of example. Thus, as has happened insimilar situations in the past, one effect of the disruptions relates toport congestion andloss of reliability in maritime services.Other key indicators in monitoring disruptions to international shipping include thereliability of container shipping services,1the average number of days of delay in the arrivalof vessels at their destination2and the level of port congestion. As figure 2 shows, at theheight of the pandemic, the relia