Ebola-nomics---OK, so the latest is that the Marine Industry and major cargo vessels are curtailing scheduled drops to Monrovia, Conakry, and Freetown so as not to infect their crews with Ebola. Furthermore, Ivory Coast has banned vessels from docking in Abidjan coming from affected Countries. This is economically MAJOR, especially since many vessels bringing BULK and CONTAINERIZED goods to LIB transship via Abidjan. The ban will mostly CERTAINLY impact BULK cargo ships and have lesser impact on Container vessels. Reason being, BULK cargo such as rice, flour, wheat, corn, cement, sugar, require that as much as 100 or so men (known in the business as Stevedores), board vessels for offloading, if shipped in bags in the hatches of the vessel. Whereas on Container vessels, the goods are offloaded only by cranes and crane operators lifting containers and NOT by hundreds of stevedores. The amount of stevedores hired for offloading is determined by the number of metric tonnage of bulk cargo to be discharged. Most stevedores working ships in LIB are hired from New Kru Town, Point Four and other communities on Bushrod Island. So bulk cargo ships are a higher risk than containerized cargo ships due to the need for large local laborers. Assuming safety and health protocols are implemented, theoretically container vessels are less risky. Given that the ports of Monrovia, Freetown, and Conakry still discharge BULK cargo with mostly manpower as opposed to advanced offloading equipment typical at most modern port facilities, this ban is going to directly impact the food supply chain and local area employment of stevedores (serious!). What this means is that importers (mainly rice importers) will have to ship these items in containers, which is a hell of a lot more expensive to do, which means the longer this crisis continues, the more likelihood that the purchase price of commodities that will usually ship in bulk but were instead shipped by Container vessels will be more costly for consumers in the stores. This is the reality we are up against. GOL needs to engage industry IMMEDIATELY and seek a workable arrangement!!! See photo below of bulk cargo (cement) being offloaded with locally hired stevedores on board the ship...
Posted on: Thu, 14 Aug 2014 18:34:21 +0000
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