Hapag-Lloyd to Establish Australia Service

Hapag-Lloyd is starting along with a partner shipping line a direct service with weekly departures from Europe to at the end of November 2008. Twelve modern vessels with adequate reefer capacity will be deployed in this service offering short transit times to ensure an enhanced coverage of the Australian market.

Subject to regulatory approvals, this will be the only direct service from Europe to via . It will replace the previous ANS service. Northbound the service will continue to call at and . Ports in , and will be added to the rotation.

The vessels to be deployed in this service will be capable of carrying 2,800 standard containers each on this route with a round voyage time of 84 days. The port rotation will be Tilbury, Hamburg, Rotterdam, Le Havre, La Spezia, Damietta, Fremantle, Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane, Melbourne, Adelaide, Singapore, Port Kelang, Chennai, Colombo, Damietta, Malta, La Spezia and back to Tilbury.

is to be called at with an independent service in future improving our presence in this market.

The Australia/New Zealand transport market is continuously expanding. Container volume between and Down Under came to approx. 550,000 standard containers (TEU) last year. According to Global Insight, this total will exceed 600,000 TEU by 2009 with annual growth rates of 4-5%. Southbound cargo is chiefly paper, cardboard, cellulose, chemicals and machinery, while mainly food (particularly meat) and beverages (wine) are shipped to .