Source: UNCTAD, Review of Maritime Transport.

Containerized Cargo Flows along Major Trade Routes, 1995-2007 (in million TEUs)

Container flows are quite representative of global trade imbalances, which have steadily been growing since the mid 1990s. For instance, there are 3 times as much containers moving from Asia to the United States (15.4 million TEUs in 2007) than vice-versa (4.9 million TEU). This implied a combined American imbalance of 12.3 million TEU with Asia and Europe. By 2005, about 70% of the slots of containerships leaving the United States were empty with major container ports such as Los Angeles handling large amounts of empty containers, 1.85 million TEU alone were exported in 2008. The Asia-Europe trade route is facing a similar imbalance, but at a lesser level; 7.7 million TEU. It is not uncommon to see whole containerships being chartered solely to reposition empty containers. Thus, production and trade imbalances in the global economy are clearly reflected in imbalances in physical flows and transport rates. Maritime shippers spend on average $100 million per year to operated their container assets. Of this, about $16 billion is spent repositioning empties.

For Transpacific trade, it costs more per TEU for eastbound flows than for westbound flows, making freight planning a complex task for container shipping companies. For Asia-Europe flows, westbound rates are higher than eastbound rates. Thus, production and trade imbalances in the global economy result in imbalances in physical flows and transport rates. Even if eastbound trans-Pacific rates are lower than westbound trans-Pacific rates, in theory conferring an advantage to American exports, costs differences are so in favor of Asia (China) that the American economy does not take much advantage of this benefit.