Gaza plan to boost Suez shipping recovery in 2025

The key maritime route for container ships and tankers had seen traffic drop by as much as 60% in the months prior to the 7 October report after Yemen-based Houthi rebels resumed attacks on merchant shipping in the Gulf of Aden and Red Sea.

In early 2024, major international carriers had begun diverting scheduled services connecting Asia to the USA, Mediterranean and Europe away from the region on voyages via the Cape of Good Hope around the Horn of Africa, adding as much as two weeks to some services, the report said.

The Suez Canal Authority saw toll revenues in 2024 drop by more than 60%, or US$6bn-US$7bn, following record revenues of US$10.25bn in 2023.

For shipping companies and insurers, the Red Sea route was considered too unstable, with attacks by Houthi militia forcing a restructuring of global shipping that had added billions of dollars to liner operators’ profits, causing a ripple effect through terminals, ports and the global supply chain, FreightWaves wrote.

Suez Canal Authority chairman Osama Rabie said he expected a gradual normalisation of ship passage this year.

A statement by the Houthis indicated they would no longer attack Western ships, amid a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, which could speed up the restoration of shipping through the Suez Canal, he said.

A separate FreightWaves report on 9 October quoted Denmark’s ambassador to Egypt as saying Danish shipping company Maersk was evaluating an eventual return to the Suez Canal.

Lars Bo Moller told a meeting with canal officials in Egypt that the world’s second-largest container line was closely following events in the Red Sea.

The Suez crisis is acutely felt in Egypt, where canal tolls account for 15% of foreign currency income and 10% of gross domestic product, according to the 7 October FreightWaves report.

Meanwhile, China had successfully tested a trans-arctic ocean route that could cut as much as 18 days off a typical voyage, FreightWaves wrote.

A cruise missile attack by the Houthis on a Dutch cargo vessel on 2 October had killed one crewman and injured another, the report said.

On average, 32 ships/day pass through the canal, down from 75 prior to the war in Gaza while supertankers hardly used the waterway, the authority said.

Tags: Suez Canal, route, Red Sea, tankers, container ships, shipping traffic, revenues