Factor	Advantage
Standard transport product	Can be manipulated anywhere in the world (ISO standard). Specialized ships, trucks and wagons.
Flexibility of usage	Commodities (coal, wheat), manufactured goods, cars, frozen products. Liquids (oil and chemical products) and Reefers (50% of all refrigerated cargo). Reuse of discarded containers.
Management	Unique identification number and a size type code. Transport management not in terms of loads, but in terms of units.
Costs	Low transport costs; 20 times less than bulk transport.
Speed	Transshipment operations are minimal and rapid. Port turnaround times reduced from 3 weeks to about 24 hours. Containerships are faster than regular freighter ships.
Warehousing	Its own warehouse; Simpler and less expensive packaging. Stacking capacity on ships, trains (doublestacking) and on the ground.
Security	Contents of the container is unknown to shippers. Can only be opened at the origin, at customs and at the destination. Reduced spoilage and losses (theft).

Factor	Challenge
Site constraints	Large consumption of terminal space; move to urban periphery. Draft issues with larger containerships.
Infrastructure costs	Container handling infrastructures (giant cranes, warehousing facilities, inland road, rail access), are important investments.
Stacking	Complexity of arrangement of containers, both on the ground and on modes (containerships and double-stack trains). Restacking difficult to avoid.
Theft and losses	Issues between terminal and final destination. 10,000 containers are lost at sea each year.
Empty movements	Many containers are moved empty (20% of all flows). Either full or empty, a container takes the same amount of space. Divergence between production and consumption; repositioning.
Illicit trade	Common instrument used in the illicit trade of drug and weapons, as well as for illegal immigration. Worries about the usage of containers for terrorism.

Advantages and Challenges of Containerization

Even if containerization conveys numerous advantages to freight distribution, it does not come without challenges.

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