DHL has a positive attitude towards the prospects of shipping
The outlook for the DHL global freight shipping market remains optimistic. Despite the industry’s continuing difficulties ranging from poor reliability of shipping schedules, capacity issues, maritime container port congestion and severe equipment shortages, the company also expects a strong ocean freight rate in the first quarter of this year. performance.
In addition to the challenging operating conditions, the third wave of coronavirus threats in Europe and other parts of the world, the spreading characteristics of mutant strains, presents a new fear of undesirable knock-on effects on economic activity and global trade a few months ago Coming to next year. But in an interview with Lloyd’s Loading List this month, Dominique von Orelli, executive vice president and head of global ocean freight forwarding at DHL Global Freight Forwarding (DGF), spoke more optimistically.
He pointed out: “Although acknowledging that there is uncertainty in the evolution of COVID-19, based on the feedback we have received from customers, we are still positive about the prospects and economic rebound.” He said: “We see that in the coming months Even in a longer period of time, the shipping business will see good growth. As the vaccine is promoted globally, we will gradually see a return to normalcy. Apart from COVID-19, I don’t think anything will affect the business. That’s why I Very optimistic about the future."
will continue to maintain a strong momentum in 2020
DGF's ocean freight department has completed its work in 2020 at a higher price. von Orelli believes that even taking into account the challenging operating conditions of the ocean freight market in the past few months, the positive performance this year will not continue.
"The fourth quarter of last year was very strong for us. We have been working hard to improve our profitability-gross profit per unit (GP) is in the double-digit percentage range. We also have a very good GP in 2020. With the improvement of ebitr, we expect these profit indicators to further improve this year.
"From a quantitative point of view, this has been declining year by year, but the decline (lower single digits) is lower than the overall decline in 2020 (a decline of nearly 11%). This is something we are not too worried about because we will not Pursue sales at any price."
The volume will return to the level of 2019
He continued: “Part of the reason is the bull market, and part of it is through our own efforts. Now we are seeing a significant rollback, and in the first quarter they are expected to return to the level of 2019 more or less - any difference between 2020 and 2020. The fact that the quarter-to-quarter comparison is distorted over the same period, China is basically closed because of the pandemic. In general, DGF's prospects in the maritime field are optimistic."
On the hot issue of COVID-19 vaccine distribution, despite its huge potential contribution to the revitalization of the international economy, von Aureli dismissed any concerns that it might exacerbate the current squeeze of shipping capacity.
"We are the leading freight forwarder in the life sciences industry and have been shipping vaccines for many years. Although the actual number of COVID-19 vaccines may seem high, when you put these batches in a shipping container, the space they occupy , Even if the number is large, it is relatively small," he explained.
"For vaccines that need to be stored at a low temperature of minus 70 to 80 degrees Celsius, shipping is not an option at all. But this model can accommodate doses stored between 2-8 degrees Celsius; although there is an important market opportunity here, it does not It is very likely to increase our current capacity pressure, at least not to increase significantly."