Since its inception doing business with vessels transiting the Suez Canal in 1924, trade by Leth Agencies has expanded into a global services provider to the world’s shipping industry.
Seizing an early prominent market position in the Suez Canal enabled expansion to the transit hubs of the Turkish Straits, the Panama Canal, the Danish Straits and Singapore waters. Extent of Leth Agencies’ operations in these waterways can be found in the headings at the top of the home page here: https://lethagencies.com/
Shortly into the New Year the company issued statistics for transits of the Suez Canal and the Panama Canal.
Suez Canal
Excel spreadsheet show the number of vessels per category in 2021 compared with 2020 numbers.
Leth reported that 2021 was the best year for the Suez Canal since 2008 with a 10.2% rise in vessels in transit. Capesize vessels have seen the largest increase, that is 46.3% more transits compared with 2020. In all 56.5 vessels transited daily in 2021 and it was found that December 2021 saw 20% more vessels than the previous December, 2020.
Shortly before the recent Christmas holiday, the Suez Canal Authority (SCA) announced that the fixed rebate scheme was extended with minor changes. Details of valid fixed rebates for the period from 1 January to 30 June 2022 may be found here:
https://lethagencies.com/uploads/files/suez/FixedRebateoverviewLethDECEMBER2021.pdf
On 4 November last year the Authority announced an increase in canal tolls of 6% with effect from 1 February 2022. This will apply to all types of ship, except LNG carriers and cruise ships. For more information readers are invited to see the SCA news item to be found here:
https://www.suezcanal.gov.eg/English/MediaCenter/News/Pages/navigation_04-11-2021.aspx
Other news from the Suez Canal Authority shows that two new tugs have been taken into service in the fleet assisting vessels transiting the Suez Canal: Svitzer Suez 1 and Svitzer Suez 2. More information on these valuable assets is available here:
December 2021 and the year in view
Leth Agencies spreadsheet data on Suez Canal transits for December 2021 and comparison with the year’s monthly totals are to be found attached.
Panama Canal
Records show that 38.4 vessels transited the Canal each day in December 2021.
The average northbound transits each day totalled 19.8 with 18.5 southbound.
For news from Canal de Panamá readers are invited to download the publication Propelling the Canal Forward, the outlook by the Panama Canal leaders for 2022, here: https://micanaldepanama.com/canal-connection-en/
December 2021 and the year in view
Leth Agencies daily transits of the Panama Canal for December 2021 with a comparison month-by-month over the year can be found on the accompanying pdf.
LethAgencies are investing considerable time and financial resources into improving client services. Going online, before most competitors in order to ease clients’ access through user-friendly communication tools, was a milestone in the transit agent industry, it was reported.
The agency’s Internet-based, online Suez Toll Calculator set new standards for cost and time-operations some 15 years ago, and was widely used by clients, ship operators at large as well as by the competition. Today clients have the benefit of conducting all their transit-related management tasks via the website.
Picture captions
Suez Canal. Photo: Christia. Hellerud, Leth Agencies.
Panama Canal. Photo: Jacob Guldager, Leth Agencies.
Latest News & Events
Shortly before the festive break the IMO Assembly held its 32nd session and adopted a resolution proclaiming an International Day for Women in Maritime, to be observed on 18 May each year.
This observance will celebrate women in the industry and is intended to promote the recruitment, retention and sustained employment of women in the maritime sector, to the profile of women in maritime, to strengthen IMO’s commitment to UN Sustainable Development Goal 5 (gender equality) and to support work to address the current gender imbalance in maritime.
The resolution invites IMO Member States, the maritime industry, and all others in the maritime endeavour to promote and celebrate the International Day for Women in Maritime in an appropriate and meaningful manner.
IMO Secretary-General Kitack Lim said: ‘This day for women in maritime will further efforts to achieve SDG 5 on gender equality. It is a perfect follow-on action to the 2019 theme of empowering women in maritime and the Assembly resolution adopted in 2019.
At the 74th session of the IALA Council in December, as part of a policy to support the vital work of IALA members around the world, issue was approved of two recommendations, twelve guidelines and three model courses.
Here below the documents are listed and may be downloaded at no charge:
Recommendations
Revised R0139 The Marking of Man-made Offshore Structures Ed3.0.
See here: https://www.iala-aism.org/product/marking-of-man-made-offshore-structures-o-139/
Revised R0126 The Use of AIS in Marine Aids to Navigation Ed2.0.
Guidelines
Revised G1078 The Use of AtoN in the Design of Fairways & Channels Ed2.0.
