First Brexit, then pandemic – and now labor disputes: A multi-day strike by dockers at Great Britain’s largest container port threatens to further burden not only the British supply chains. “Almost half of British container traffic goes through the port of Felixstowe and 65 percent of incoming containers,” said British trade expert Rebecca Harding of the German Press Agency. An eight-day strike that began on Sunday puts imports and exports worth around £800m (around €950m) at risk, with the clothing and electronics sectors being particularly hard hit.
But the strike is by no means just an issue for the island: global container traffic at sea, the lifeline of world trade, has been increasingly out of step since the outbreak of the corona pandemic two and a half years ago. Every disruption, such as lockdowns in individual ports, an accident like that of the “Ever Given” in the Suez Canal or labor disputes, throws additional sand into the gears – even if a port like Felixstowe is not a very big player in the coordinated mechanism of sea logistics on an international scale .
“One reason for the strained logistics at sea and in the ports is the low punctuality rate of ships,” says economist Vincent Stamer, who analyzes global container traffic at the Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW). “Additional strikes will worsen this situation – including the impending strike at Britain’s largest port of Felixstowe.” In addition, logisticians also fear new warning strikes in Germany. That would be possible if the next wage round in the dispute over dock workers’ wages is unsuccessful on Monday. Most recently, the Verdi union paralyzed handling at all German North Sea ports for 48 hours in mid-July.
In Felixstowe, 1,900 port workers on the east coast of England wanted to lay down their jobs. “Not many people showed up for work this morning,” said Miles Hubbard of the Unite union. This had called for the strike after an agreement with the employer, the Felixstowe Dock and Railway Company, had failed. The offer of a seven percent wage increase is not high enough for the union in view of skyrocketing consumer prices. Inflation climbed to over 10 percent in the UK in July. Unite announced the strike will “send massive shockwaves through UK supply chains”. In Liverpool, too, the dockers want to lay down their work shortly.
The extent to which the strike disrupts the shipping companies’ already stressed schedules depends heavily on the role the port plays in them. Co-industry leader Maersk expects “significant effects on the ship program”, as a spokesman for the Danish shipping company says. The port should be called during the strike days by almost a dozen container giants. “While we are maintaining all ship calls at Felixstowe, we expect some arrival times to be either significantly advanced or postponed.” The Hamburg shipping company Hapag-Lloyd
The port association British Ports Association has not yet expected any long-term effects on British supply chains. In recent years, there has been a lot of investment in the infrastructure, which is why it is also possible – if necessary – to temporarily handle more container freight than usual.
Ulrich Hoppe, Director of the German-British Chamber of Industry and Commerce, believes that short-term bottlenecks are unlikely. “I don’t think we will see empty shelves in supermarkets,” he told dpa. Fresh produce such as fruit and vegetables would tend to go through the port of Dover. It is conceivable, however, that goods such as toys from China that are usually transported in containers will be delayed – and further pressure will be placed on the supply chains, which are already burdened by the pandemic and other challenges.
“Trade between Britain and the rest of the world, especially the EU, has already collapsed in the past year and each new disruption increases the already increasing pressure,” said trade expert Harding. She thinks it’s possible that inflation could continue to rise if key supply chains go haywire. “It would further exacerbate the cost of living crisis, which is already so severe in the UK.”
From a German perspective, according to IfW economist Stamer, the consequences should be limited: “British goods can also be transported to Germany via the Eurotunnel and ferries, and goods from the United Kingdom only account for 2.7 percent of German imports anyway out.” (dpa)