For the first time since February this year, global shipping lines have recorded decline in performamce ratings.

According to the current edition of SeaIntel’s Global Liner Performamce report unveiled yesterday, the drop amounts to almost four percentage points from 75.6 per cent in June to 71.6 per cent.

The report explained that shipping giants Maersk Line, Hamburg Süd and Hanjin are still the most reliable liners, adding that Hyundai Merchant Marine, MOL, NYK were found at the other end of the list of the world’s top 20 shipping lines.

Three major trade lines were hit hardest, based on SeaIntel’s report, those being the transpacific eastbound, Asia-Mediterranean and Asia-north Europe routes.

It explained that congestion issues in Rotterdam and Hamburg are believed to be the biggest contributors to liner reliability downturn between Asia and Europe, which fell for 20 percentage points.

The drop was further fueled by longshore contract talks in the United States along with port workers strike in Chile, as explained by SeaIntel Chief Operating Officer Alan Murphy.

According to SeaIntel’s mid-year review during the second quarter, the overall industry reliability was improving.

However, there was a widening gap between industry players.

Maersk Line scored an above-industry rating of 86.1%, which was facilitated by fair weather and fewer port closures for the quarter.

As the leading liner for Q2, Maersk Line drove the industry gap to 11%, overtaking Hamburg Süd and CSAV with 84.1% and 79.6%, respectively, the report added

The world’s biggest and second biggest shipping lines, Maersk and MSC, had recently sought permission from the United States Federal Maritime Commission (FMC) to form a vessel sharing agreement called the 2M.

Already, Copenhagen’s Maersk Line and Geneva’s Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC), have submitted their 10-year agreement proposal to the Washington regulatory agency.

The FMC allowed the more ambitious P3 alliance, a union of the top three shipping lines that included CMA CGM, but this was rejected by Chinese regulatory authorities as having too much market share.

Washington has 45 days to review the new proposal, though procedings can be suspended if the FMC wants additional information.

The new arrangement is a standard vessel sharing agreement, unlike P3, which looked more like a merger to Chinese regulators despite protest from the participants.

In the 2M case, the European Commission and China’s Ministry of Transport will be notified, but do not have to give official clearance to a vessel sharing agreement, which like an airline code share, has independent and rival sales teams selling space of their own and on each other’s conveyances.

The document submitted to the FMC covers ports in the northern Europe-Gibraltar range, plus the Med to the US Atlantic, Gulf and Pacific coasts, along with ports in Mexico, Canada, Panama, the Bahamas and Asia to the US.

2M covers Asia-Europe routes but this is of no concern to the FMC. With US trades, 2M parties can discuss and agree on the size, number and types of vessels. They plan to operate 97 ships in US trades ranging from 4,000 to 13,000 TEU (Twenty foot Equivalent Units.)

Meanwhile, Drewry Maritime Research forecasts five to six per cent container shipping growth in next few years, and Maersk chief Nils Andersen predicts much the same, while a new methodology has been devised that produces more optimistic conclusions.

New optimism comes from independent box analyst Daniel Schaefer who’s new study notes an acceleration in world trade, reports Lloyd’s List.

Analysts, he says, must have reasonable methodologies, and that’s what has been missing from conventional projections.

Schaefer criticised the so-called GDP multiplier method, in which growth rates are determined by GDP forecasts, combined with other factors. GDP multipliers, he says, often vary and all too often produce misleading results.

Instead, Schaefer correlates container throughput data with the imports and exports of global manufacturers to calculate what the future will hold.

Using his method, Schaefer expects global container throughput of 650 million TEU in 2013 to achieve compound annual growth rates of 6.1 per cent or 985 million TEU by 2020.

But regional growth, he said, will differ with China still leading the pack, handling a third of the world’s container traffic.

While China growth has slowed, it remains above the global average at 6.5 per cent. Schaefer expects China volume to rise to 340 million TEU by 2020, more than half of today’s total.

The fastest-growing countries are Singapore, South Korea, Malaysia, Vietnam, Indonesia and India, he said.

In Africa, he said, much depends on whether several planned sub-Saharan container terminals go ahead that could stimulate trade in the region.

“Nonetheless, throughput is projected to increase from a relative low level, because infrastructure in is still poor and 250 million people live in landlocked countries,” he said.

Box volumes in the Americas have grown well below the global average lately, reflecting a stagnant US market.

But with the US economy improving, box volume is expected to rise from 94 million TEU to 133 million TEU.

European port box growth over the last five years has stood at three per cent, which he expects to 4.8 per cent to 152 million TEU.