French line upsizes Asia-Africa service

The French-based shipping line, CMA CGM, is upsizing its Asia-Africa “ASAF” service with 4 000-4 300- TEU gearless ships displaced from the Far East-East Coast South America (ECSA) route by ships of 8 000-9 000 TEU capacity. The bigger ships on the ASAF service are the 4 308-TEU CMA CGM Opal and the 4 250-TEU CMA CGM Azure, which are to be shifted to the service in August. They follow the 4 252-TEU SC Rotterdam, which was chartered, and was the first 4 000+ TEU ship to join the service last month. The line also chartered two 3 534-TEU ships in June and July – the Northern Dexterity and Georg Schulte. All these ships replace units of 2 500-3 000 TEU vessels. The number of ships used is also expected to be increased from 10 to 12 units to reach a notional weekly frequency.