[121219.EN.SEA] Matson and Swire Shipping Team Up On South Pacific Service

PACIFIC Ocean specialist carrier Matson and Swire Shipping have entered into a vessel-sharing partnership, starting from January.

Swire Shipping will charter and deploy a vessel on the new service, while Matson will deploy the Imua II and the Olomana. Both ships are 8,000 deadweight tonnes.

The service will depart Auckland, New Zealand, and will serve Tonga, Samoa (Apia), the Cook Islands and Fiji with a departure from Auckland every ten days, reported New York's FreightWaves.

"Today's launch will enable us to offer expanded global coverage into the Pacific Islands, as well as specifically providing New Zealand customers with a new direct service alternative.

"We will be working closely with customers?to explore opportunities for landside delivery in the Pacific Islands as well as offering innovative digital solutions," said Swire Shipping general manager Jeremy Sutton.

Executives involved with the South Pacific Islands trade have previously confirmed to FreightWaves that there has traditionally been extensive and extremely hard-fought competition between the carriers to/from this region.

Matson originally entered the South Pacific trades in the 1920s. It re-entered the trades in 2012/2013 after it bought Auckland's Reef Shipping, which entered into receivership. Matson nowadays offers several services to the South Pacific Islands from Australia, New Zealand and the west coast of the United States.

Source : HKSG.