What does an American anti-dumping duty, Chinese EVs and Indian container shortage have in common? In one word, everything. With the US imposing a 100% anti-dumping duty on Chinese electric vehicles from August 1 and several countries in Europe planning to follow suit in September and October, the Chinese EV industry has been on production overdrive to ship as many vehicles as possible before the duty deadline.
This pile up of inventory has clogged an already stretched logistics network. Siddharth Jairaj, CEO, TVS SCS global forwarding solutions said, “Because of the anti-dumping duties, China has been shipping out huge numbers of electric vehicles since April and May to beat the duty deadlines. So global nodal ports like Singapore and Colombo and clogged.”
As containers are being diverted to cater to “Chinese inventory, the port congestion is spreading and has now hit India too,” he added.
The trouble is this current pinch is exacerbating an already stressed shipping network. Rejyson Samuel, director & CEO, Sandook Logistics said, “The container shortage began with the geo-political problems in Europe and then Middle East and the time and cost increase has been substantial.”
According to him, the Europe to India transit, which earlier took 24 days to 30 days now takes 55 to 60 days. “Last one week, Chennai port too is totally congested with wait for containers stretching to two weeks,” he said.
Logistics analysts say the port dwell time in Indian hubs show the extent of the congestion spread. Hemal Thakkar, senior practice leader & director – consulting, CRISIL Market Intelligence & Analytics said, “As per NLDS logistics databank the dwell time in APSEZ (Adani Ports & SEZ) and JNPA (Jawaharlal Nehru Port Authority) has increased by eight to nine hours.”
