World’s third largest shipping line mounts Philippines route

MANILA, Philippines — Shipping giant CNC has become the first full foreign company to offer a domestic service in the Philippines, assigning a new ship to dock in Manila, Cebu and Cagayan de Oro weekly.

CNC, a unit of French shipper CMA CGM, on Friday operated its maiden voyage for the Luzon Visayas Mindanao Express (LVMX), marking its first local route in the country.

CMA CGM, the world’s third biggest shipper by container capacity, decided to mount the service to offer traders an alternative when exporting within the archipelago.

CMA CGM CEO for Asia-Pacific Bo Wegener said that CNC Pilipinas that has a capacity to carry 1,037 twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) would serve the LVMX.

The ship will sail from Manila and land in Cagayan de Oro and Cebu, before returning to Manila, all in a week’s span.

CNC CEO Steven Zhu expects the LVMX to contribute in the transport of goods across Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao. In the process, he believes the service can help in bringing down transport costs and in cutting retail prices.

Wegener said the shipper chose to dock in Manila, Cebu and Cagayan de Oro given the demand for shipping in this corridor, especially for the transport of consumer products like food and rice.

Moreover, Zhu said the logistics demand within the Philippines would only go up from here on, as the country picks up economic gains from growing consumption and its young population.

Transportation Undersecretary Elmer Sarmiento said the launch of LVMX improves competition in domestic shipping, expanding options for prices and services to the benefit of traders.

Prior to this, CNC operated in the Philippines by way of other countries. It links 10 international routes to nine ports in the country. The shipper employs around 4,000 Filipinos in its seafarer network.

CNC deploys an all-Filipino crew of 20 seafarers for LVMX. In the future, CNC aims to explore opportunities in other ports around the archipelago as part of the strategy to expand further.

CNC managed to operate a Philippine service following the lifting of foreign ownership limits in the shipping industry, thanks to amendments made in the Public Service Act.

Based on records from the Philippine Ports Authority, the country grew its container throughput by two percent to 3.73 million TEUs in the six months to June, from 3.67 million a year ago, and is projected to expand faster as the holiday demand comes in.