Ships are being built at the Nosco – Vinalines Ship Repair Plant in the northern province of Quanng Ninh. (Photo: VNA) Hanoi (VNA) - Vietnam’s sea transportsector has maintained good growth recently with the volume of goods transportedby the Vietnamese fleet reaching more than 81 million tonnes in the first halfof 2019, a year-on-year increase of 16 percent.
According to the Vietnam Maritime Administration(VMA), the structure of Vietnam's shipping fleet is developing towardsspecialisation, with the container fleet growing from 19 ships in 2013 to 39 in2019. Additionally, Vietnam’s average fleet age is 15.6, 5.2 years younger thanthe global average of 20.8.
Statistics from the United Nations Conference onTrade and Development (UNCTAD) show the Vietnamese fleet ranks fourth in ASEANand 30th in the world in terms of dead-weight tonnage.
On the management of river-sea compatible ships(VR-SB), a VMA representative said the policy of establishing a coastaltransport route to relieve the burden on road transportation is justified.
However, according to VMA Deputy Director BuiThien Thu, the development plan for the inland ship fleet in 2015-2020 onlyprioritised the development of VR-SB ships with a tonnage of up to 5,000tonnes, but actually there are many newly built ships of capacities of over20,000 tonnes.
Currently, there is no inland waterway port thatcan accommodate a vessel this size, so large VR-SB vessels only enter and exitthe seaport to transport cargo, directly compete with the domestic fleet. Thisaffects the development of the inland shipping fleet, as well as theshipbuilding industry and crew training, Thu added.
Therefore, the VMA plans to work with agencies topropose solutions to better manage VR-SB in accordance with internationalregulations and practices on safety and maritime security.
Statistics from VMA show that in the first half ofthis year, Vietnams ports handled 308.8 million tonnes of goods, up 13 percentcompared to the same period in 2018. Notably, the volume of container cargoreached 9.1 million twenty-foot equivalent unit (TEUs), up 3 percentyear-on-year.
However, Vietnam's shipping industry is stillchallenged by a dwindling fleet.
The number of ships has decreased from 1,600 in2018 to 1,568 at present, with total capacity of about 4.8 million grosstonnage (GT) and total tonnage of 7.8 million deadweight tonnage (DWT).
Economists see this as a worrying figure becausewhen the fleet declines strongly, the goal of meeting 100 percent of domesticfreight transport output will be difficult to achieve.-VNA
VNA
