New Sea-air opportunities from China

30 April 2020

As a result of the worldwide corona crisis, opportunities to air-freight goods from China have become seriously limited due to the cancellation of many flights. This means that tariffs have risen exponentially. In these troublesome times, Ritra Cargo continues to endeavour to find new ways and opportunities. In the light of this we informed you last month of the possibilities by rail, to complement air freight. This month we would like to turn the spotlight on another alternative; Sea-air from China.

An alternative to air freight

Now that air freight has become difficult we, in collaboration with two agents from our own network, would like to offer you a more economical alternative from today. For shipments that need to reach the Netherlands reasonably fast, you can now also consider a sea-air route via South Korea.

In view of local distances and the costs involved, this service is only suitable for shipments from the Shanghai, Ningbo, Qingdao, Beijing and Tianjin regions.

How it works

A short description of sea-air :

• there are daily sailings from the port of Weihai, China (approx. 1000 km north of Shanghai) to the port of Incheon, Seoul;
• upon docking, shipments are transfered to Seoul’s airport (this normally takes less than half a day);
• shipments are air-freighted from Seoul airport to Schiphol, Amsterdam.

An example: a shipment from the Shanghai region (by road haulage to port of Weihai – Incheon Port and connecting transfer to Seoul’s airport) will take 8 to 9 days to arrive at Schiphol Amsterdam.

The minimum weight per shipment has been set at 500 kgs. We monitor the tariffs and the options on a daily basis and of course carefully consider each case individually. Currently these rates also remain exceptionally high, however they are approx. 30% lower than current air freight tariffs.

Could this be something for you?

Then please contact our air freight team. Jeanmarien, Mike and Rob can be reached by phone on +31(0) 20 655 40 60 or by email at import@ritra-air.nl