Ocean vessel and seaborne cargo statistics
In the first quarter of 1996, 9,862 ocean vessels with a total capacity of 43.4 million net registered tons arrived at Hong Kong, according to the statistics released today (Monday) by the Census and Statistics Department.
Net registered ton (NRT) is a unit of measure in volume terms of the space of a vessel available for carrying passengers or goods. One NRT is equivalent to 100 cubic feet.
Compared with the first quarter of 1995, these figures reflected an increase of 6% in number of vessels and 11% in capacity.
During the same period, there were 9,875 outgoing ocean vessels with a total capacity of 43.3 million net registered tons, representing an increase of 5% in number and 9% in capacity over the first quarter of 1995.
In the first quarter of 1996, the total tonnage of seabome inward cargo comprising seaborne imports and seaborne inward transhipment, was estimated to be 19.9 million tonnes, representing an increase of 3% over the same quarter in 1995. Within these cargoes, the tonnage of seaborne imports grew by 3%, while that of seaborne inward transhipment had little changed.
During the same period, the total tonnage of seaborne outward cargo comprising seaborne exports (domestic exports plus re-exports) and seaborne outward transhipment, was estimated to be 8.8 million tonnes, representing a decrease of 1% over the same quarter in 1995.
The decline was concentrated in seaborne exports, which fell by 5%. On the other hand, having shown substantial increases for eight consecutive quarters, the total tonnage of seaborne outward transhipment grew by 4%.
Of the seaborne inward cargo, 82% in terms of tonnage were seaborne imports and 18% were seaborne inward transhipment. 54% of these cargoes were containerised.
Of the seaborne outward cargo, 54% in terms of tonnage were seaborne exports (domestic exports plus re-exports) and 46% were seaborne outward transhipment. Eighty nine per cent of them were containerised cargo.
The above statistics are summarised in Table 1.
In the first quarter of 1996, the top five countries of loading for seaborne inward cargo (comprising seaborne imports and seaborne inward transhipment) were Singapore (which accounted for 19% in tonnage terms), Japan (14%), China (10%), Taiwan (10%) and USA (9%).