Early peak season on busy intra-Asia trade drawing to a close
Intra-Asia freight rates have been declining in what appears to be the end of an ...
In his 2025 ‘Lunch with Lars’ session that traditionally closes the annual TPM conference in Long Beach, liner analyst Lars Jensen predicted that soon we would witness a new trade route emerge in global container supply chains – “what I’m currently terming the Indian Rim trade, stretching from South Africa, all the way along the Middle East, Indian subcontinent, South-east Asia and Oceania…”
This week, maritime consultancy Sea-Intelligence took the concept a step further, analysing the spectacular 2025 volume growth in what it terms the Asia-Africa ‘megaregion’, which for container data purposes, Container Trades Statistics (CTS) divides into three regions: the Far East; Middle East; Indian subcontinent; and sub-Saharan Africa.
Combined, these are home to around 75% of the world’s population, and with 650m new people added to the population across Africa and Asia from 2019-2030, it is clearly where the bulk of future demographic growth is forecast to take place.
“The growth in population in the megaregion from 2019 to 2030 is of a magnitude equal to the total population in North America, or only slightly less than the total population in Europe,” it said.
“From a demographic perspective, it is clear that this will be shifting the importance of container volume growth, to increasingly favour the megaregion when measured in teu.
“But are we already seeing such an impact?” Sea-Intelligence additionally asked.
The data certainly suggests that recent growth rates – such as the latest CTS numbers for September, which showed Far East-Middle East/India and Far East-sub-Saharan Africa volumes for the month were up 22.5% and 32.5% respectively year on year – have actually been relatively constant since Q3 19, shortly before the pandemic, and have been nearly three times that seen in Europe and North America.
Source: Sea-Intelligence Consulting
The following chart shows the nine specific trade routes that criss-cross the region – intra-Asia, intra-Africa, Intra-Middle East/Indian subcontinent, Far-East Africa, Far East-Middle East/Indian subcontinent, Africa- Middle East/Indian subcontinent, and the respective backhauls.
The intra-Middle East/Indian subcontinent is the only trade not to have posted double-digit growth over the same period.
Source: Sea-Intelligence Consulting
While the potential of these markets is beginning to be realised, especially with the opening of new deepwater port facilities across Africa and India to facilitate that growth, the carrier market serving the trades looks ripe for consolidation and M&A activity, particularly with larger carriers looking for new markets to supplant faltering transpacific volumes.
“The tradelanes in the megaregion are much more fragmented than the east-west trades and are presently serviced by a wide array of regional niche carriers. This creates a highly competitive environment, and we would expect pressure on pricing, as well as substantial M&A activity, in this region over the next decade,” Sea-Intelligence noted.
“The megaregion across Asia and Africa will see substantial growth in teu volumes in the years – and even decades – ahead. The simple driving force is to be found in the demographic development.
“The main unknown parameter is how much the economic improvement will be per capita across the megaregion, but it is highly likely that this development, on a percentage growth basis, is also going to be higher than in the developed economies in Europe and North America,” it added.
Listen to this clip of Mohammed Akoojee, CEO of Sub-Saharen Africa DP World, speaking on The Loadstar Podcast about why Africa is increasingly being seen as a critical player in global trade:
Indeed, this appears to have already taken place. Earlier this month, thinktank Asia House published The Middle East Pivot to Asia: the Gulf’s rise as a global middle power, which underlined how far trade between the Middle East and Asia, particularly China, has grown this year.
“Gulf-Asia trade now stands at record highs, after rising a faster-than-expected 14.4%, from $451bn to $516bn, between 2023 and 2024. Based on the current trajectory, trade volumes will reach $802bn by 2030, with Asia surpassing advanced economies to become the Gulf’s largest trading bloc in 2028,” it found.
Meanwhile, the latest data from Container Trades Statistics shows volumes on the Middle East/Indian subcontinent-Far East trade surpassed the Middle East/Indian subcontinent-Europe trade for the first time in September, with 300,000 teu shipped to Asia compared with 287,400 teu shipped to Europe.
To hear more about this topic, listen to the full Loadstar Podcast epsiode on Africa’s logistics boom!
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