SHIPS IDLE.

Taranaki Daily News, 22 February 1921, Page 5

SHIPS IDLE.

HUGE TONNAGE HELD UP. fefiAVY losses being incurred. JNTENSE FOREIGN COMPETITION. Br Telegraph.—Press Assn.—Copyright. Received Feb. 21, 5.5 p.m. • London, Feb. 20. The Chamber of Shipping has issued a report on the condition of the industry. It states that at the end of January five million dead-weight tonnage was laid up in British, American, and Scandinavian ports owing to the absence of cargoes and the expansion of the world’s tonnage. The report points out that the expansion must continue in view of the tonnage under construction, even allowing for the replacement of old ships with new. The report says that in the present conditions very little shipping can run at e. profit, and heavy losses were recently incurred on a great mahy voyages. British shipowners in 1920 were engaged in picking up the threads of trade broken during the war, and considerable progress was made in regaining the longer routes, from which they had withdrawn owing to submarines. They also started several new services, despite discouragement to private enterprise from State-owned shipping in France, Canada, Australia, South Africa, and the United States. The report anticipates intense foreign competition, apart from Government competition, and points out that all the principal Dutch companies have formed a combine, and a similar attempt is being made in Japan. Though earnings have slumped, there has been no reduction of running charges, except for coal. The increase in expenses of foreign voyages over the pre-war level was 20 per cent.

As instancing the fall in freights, the Chamber of Shipping quotes twelve month general time charters, which have dropped from 25s a ton during 1920 to 10s in December and 7s 6d last month. r—Aus.-N.Z. Cable Assn.