The latest lockdowns imposed by China to curb a rapid surge in COVID infections threaten to disrupt supply chains and exacerbate the already tight supply situation in the container market. CNBC-TV18 spoke to Jakob Friis Sorensen, MD of Gujarat Pipavav Port, to understand the impact.

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Sorensen said, “This is a perpetual situation almost for the last two years. We have had congestion on the US West Coast and in many other places in Europe. We had a shortage of drivers and so on. So, it's just one of many of these things that keeps on hitting the industry. In general, that is tying up the capacity for ships and, of course, when you close down a very important Chinese port, then that's bound to have a domino effect in the system.”

He added, “I don't think we will see any impact but for the system at large and for the vessels that are going between Asia and to India, there will be some impact because, again, everything is interlinked. So, when you have a disruption in China, it has such domino effect that it knocks on to a lot of other shipping lines.”

Sorensen said that the other big disruptor is the Ukraine-Russia crisis.

For the full interview, watch the accompanying video.

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First Published:Mar 15, 2022 3:02 PM IST