News / Forwarders look to shipper-owned containers to boost reliability

Credit: DP World Cochin

With the pressure on equipment capacity showing no sign of abating, freight forwarders are increasingly turning to “shipper-owned containers (SOCs)” to minimise the risk associated with port congestion and potential penalties, amid Covid-induced supply chain dysfunction.

A study by Container xChange, a digital platform for equipment management, has found that the level of the top 50 forwarders accepting SOC requests had risen sequentially from 6% in 2019 to 18 % in 2021, a three-fold change.

SOCs are the ...