News in Brief

One of Korea’s biggest shipping lines has gone into receivership on the back of recession-related losses. Korea Line, the republic’s second biggest bulk carrier was affected by low freight rates caused by an oversupply of bulk vessels. The majority of the vessels it operates are chartered-in and attempts to re-negotiate charter deals to offset the declining rates failed. Korea Line said it would need to re-structure in order to gain financial support from banks to keep it afloat.

Shipping line Safmarine has introduced a mobile website offering for its customers. The new service can be accessed by all major mobile devices and smart phones.

Dubai International Airport saw robust cargo growth in 2010 as air freight demand recovered from the slump of 2009. Annual cargo traffic jumped 17.7% to 2.27m tonnes last year, close to the airport’s capacity of 2.5 million tonnes. With further growth predicted this year, some cargo operations are expected to be migrated to the new Dubai World Central-Al Maktoum International during 2011. 

Finnair Cargo and Neff Capital Management are considering a joint-venture offering international freighter services from Helsinki, prompted by increased cargo demand.

Source IFW

U Freight on the move in China.
As a result of steady business expansion, the UFL office in Yantai, China was relocated at the end of last year (this is the office of UFL subsidiary, Dalian China Express International Transportation Ltd).

The address of the new office is Room 1309, Huaxin International Building, No. 28, Changjiang Road, ETDZ Yantai 264006, China Tel. (86) 0535 3975315 Fax (86) 0535 3975215
As one of the first non-local forwarders to develop a network in China, UFL has continued to increase its presence in China through a range of strategic office openings and relocations that has worked to consolidate U-Freight’s strategic involvement in one of the world’s busiest and most important freight markets.

The developments place the U-Freight group in a strong position to ensure a high profile in the Chinese import and export markets. In China the company operates under a number of brands including U-Freight China, Shanghai Rijin, Dalian China Express and Shanghai Renaissance - each servicing different trades or types of industry. In Ireland, UFL have been working exclusively with EFL International Distribution Ltd., a wholely owned Irish company, well known in the Irish market.

Relocations, such as this in Yantai, allow us to take advantage of what we see as China’s second phase of economic and industrial development, we look to these developments to allow us to increase our intra-Asian services into and out of China which we are confident can only get even better.