Yantian Port back online but Nansha Port suspends operations
Yantian resumed normal operations on June 24 after a month-long disruption due to a Covid-19 outbreak that sharply reduced capacity in the key South China gateway, but backlogs will take weeks to be cleared and in true form to the fickleness of the pandemic, on June 23rd, Nansha Port announced an emergency suspension of all export business.
The closure was driven by precautions to limit the Delta variant of COVID-19. Only export containers arriving up to 7 days before a vessel’s departure will be permitted. Carriers have begun to omit Nansha and other South China ports with 90 vessels currently bypassing the port – up from 84 last week. These omissions will delay import laden containers on the omitting vessels by up to 3 weeks. The current yard density at Nansha has reached 100% and the limitation on export laden containers is expected to remain for 4-5 days.
With 343 Million tons and container throughput of 17.22 million TEUs in 2020 Nansha Port is a key export location for China container exports
