Companies are being aided in their comebacks by a pickup in the global economy and a trade boom in China, which continues to help fill vessels and bottom lines.

The return to profitability has been seen in the stock price of many of the best known names in the industry with OOIL, OOCL’s parent company, Evergreen Marine, Wan Hai and Yang Ming Transport all seeing their share price heading upward.

This may be good news, but some investors have jumped ship as the increases have proved too rich for their blood, leading to profit taking and even sell offs.

Two such victims of their own success are Korean lines Hyundai Merchant Marine and Hanjin Shipping, The Asian Wall Street Journal reported.

For the most part, however, Asian container lines future fortunes are expected to continue to head in the right direction as freight rates to Europe from Asia in 2004 are predicted to grow 11 per cent, with a more modest climb of some 7.5 per cent being touted on transpacific routes.

Earlier this year, Ecu-Line’s Singapore office started direct groupage services to Huangpu and Suzhou and recently also started a service to Beijing.

The company said this routing saves shippers expense and gives consignees the advantage of having their goods custom-cleared at Beijing, instead of Xingang, where cargo was previously cleared by Chinese customs.

High Goal Intertrans is responsible for the release of cargo in Beijing.

Set to be in operation from next month, KLZF will offer comprehensive logistics services to satisfy clients’ evolving demand for logistics services in China.

One of KLZF’s main business areas will be sea freight. The company said KLZF will provide freight forwarding services such as customs brokerage, trucking and warehousing, to supplement current K Line group activities in China, which are represented by the liner container service of K Line (China) Ltd.

KLZF will also service air freight forwarding clients and have an operating base in Shanghai for K Line Air Service’s worldwide network. The unit will handle air cargo export and import services, door-to-door delivery, arrangement of customs clearance and consultation on trade/logistics in China.

Another core business for KLZF will be supply chain management (SCM) and total logistics.

October cargo throughput was up 5.1 per cent when compared with October last year. Cargo throughput for the past 12 months reached 2.59 million tonnes, a 7.9 per cent increase over the same period a year ago and marked another record high.

Strong cargo growth has been driven by a robust recovery of the US economy, and surging shipping orders to the US and Europe for the Thanksgiving and Christmas seasons.

In October, cargo flights increased by 4.7 per cent, while passenger flights decreased by 0.5 per cent.

AaE is a joint venture between Australia Post and Qantas carrying Australia’s official mail and commercial air freight.

To fulfill the contract, National Jet will acquire six Boeing 727 aircraft and other assets previously operated by TransAustralian Air Pty Ltd (which is in administration) for a consideration of A$11 million paid in cash.

National Jet will also take on approximately 100 staff and jet base operations in Melbourne to service a network throughout Australia.

The 727 operations will significantly expand upon National Jet’s existing BAe network with 146 air freight operations capability, which National Jet currently provide to AaE and will complement and strengthen other existing business in the region.

The contract will see more than 59 million kilogrammes of freight delivered to capital cities across Australia on an annual basis.

During the quarter, Pilot handled a record 211,034 shipments totalling 109.8 million pounds, up 24 per cent and nine per cent, respectively from 2002.

The third quarter was the seventh consecutive quarter of increased shipments for Pilot Air Freight.

Richard Phillips, chairman, president and CEO of Pilot, said: “Pilot Air Freight continues to hit on all cylinders, with our revenues and shipments increasing, and our market share growing.”

In the first nine months of 2003, Pilot delivered 608,960 shipments, an increase of 28 per cent from the same period in 2002.

These shipments represented 306.8 million pounds and $183.4 million in revenues, an increase of 14 per cent and 28 per cent, respectively, from the first nine months of 2002.

Capacity rose 1.7 per cent and the cargo load factor stood at 65.5 per cent, down 0.6 percentage points.

Passenger operations activity regained last year’s level in October, with a slight improvement in traffic (up 0.4 per cent), in spite of the unfavourable calendar effects due to school holidays.

Capacity increased by 1.5 per cent and the passenger load factor declined by 0.9 percentage points to 76.8 per cent.

Menlo PLM is a highly customisable solution that determines the most cost-effective mode of transport and transportation alternatives based on the number of pieces, origin, destination, shipment weight, ready time and carrier tariffs.

Through a link to the Federal Aviation Authority’s global satellite tracking service, the system automatically pinpoints the exact in-transit location of all aircraft and flights at any given time.

In addition, it provides real-time weather updates, providing alternate routes in the event of weather diversions or airport closures.

Customer connection to Menlo PLM can occur via phone, e-mail or the web. Menlo PLM is now available for all North American shipments and is planned to be a global solution.

The port of Shanghai accounted for 8.2 million TEU, up 33.1 per cent, while Shenzhen Port accounted for 7.611 million TEU, a rise of 38.6 per cent.

Other ports that handled more than one million TEU included: Qingdao (3.121 million TEU); Tianjin (2.241 million TEU); Ningbo (1.994 million TEU); Guangzhou (1.965 million TEU); Xiamen (1.711 million TEU); and Dalian (1.152 million TEU).

As for total throughput, China’s major ports handled 1.93 billion tons of cargo, up 18 per cent year on year.

Coastal ports accounted for 1.46 billion tons, a 18.9 per cent increase, while river ports accounted for 470 million tons, a rise of 15.2 per cent.

Throughput for the third quarter was 740 million tons, an increase of 31.4 per cent over the same period last year.

From January to September, Shanghai Port handled 230 million tons of cargo, up 19.2 per cent. Foreign trade accounted for 94.77 million tons, up 22.3 per cent.

Shenzhen Port handled 81.43 million tons, a rise of 26.8 per cent.

In addition, cargo handled on highways during the same period amounted to 7.82 billion tons, up 98.9 per cent over the same period last year.

The move returns more than 200 jobs to Jersey City.

The new address is 1 Evertrust Plaza, Jersey City, NJ 07302.

For 10 years, Evergreen America maintained its head offices at the Evertrust Building, which is owned by an Evergreen Group division, before moving to Morristown four years ago.

Originally established as a service agent office for imports from Europe and the US, Panalpina Korea started in a modest downtown office with a staff of three.

Today, Panalpina Korea has 90 employees in three offices in Seoul, Pusan and Incheon in addition to two agents.

Peter Ziegler, managing director of Panalpina Korea, said: “Panalpina Korea has been known for its world-class products and services, and the continuous commitment to the local market.

“We are proud to share our global experience with our Korean partners and look forward to many more years of listening to and meeting supply chain requirements for the partners we work with here.”