New West Africa feeder benefits SA shippers

The opening up by Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC) of a West Africa feeder service in February, connecting ports in Liberia and Sierra Leone to the Ivory Coast, will also benefit the SA-West Africa service, according to marketing director Glenn Delve. The dedicated feeder will deploy one vessel every 10 days to provide a port rotation of San Pedro (Ivory Coast), Monrovia (Liberia), Freetown (Sierra Leone) and San Pedro. It will connect San Pedro (where MSC also has an office) to the transhipment ports of Las Palmas and Valencia. And Las Palmas is not only a hub for European cargo to-and-from Africa, Delve added, but also for SA cargo bound to-and-from Europe and West Africa. Delve told FTW that the latest news released from MSC in Geneva was that the shipping line planned to initially use OBT Shipping as its agent for both Liberia and Sierra Leone, and to later “establish MSC agency offices in both countries”.