Filiera Italia, the foundation promoted by Coldiretti and which brings together the largest companies in the agro-food sector and also the world of large-scale distribution raises the alarm for the exponential increase in the cost of freight rates and asks the Italian government not only to support interventions for boost exports but also to urge the EU to open an antitrust investigation.
What’s going on? “Almost two years after the start of the pandemic, transport costs are still recorded over 10,000 dollars (increased by 3/4 times) which show no sign of decreasing”, reads a letter that the foundation chaired by Luigi Scordamaglia wrote to Minister of Agriculture. But in addition to the costs, there is growing concern for the “low availability of containers” and the multiplication of “some practices of operators such as” blank sailing “and the cancellation without notice of shipments that strongly penalize Italian agri-food exports”. According to Filiera Italia, “highly speculative and unjustified behavior is taking place on the part of the main shipping companies responsible for the world trade in containers”.
This situation is also caused by the other concentration of the world maritime transport sector where three top carriers hold 45% of freight traffic and the top ten in the ranking cover 80%. For Filiera Italia it is “an indisputable oligopoly that is causing enormous economic damage to businesses” and that requires “forms of support to enhance the export of our Made in Italy companies” which risks being compromised.
The first warning signs had already arrived in June when Alberto Balocco, president and managing director of the Fossano confectionery industry, put it down like this: “Disappeared as if a fleet of alien ships had decided to transfer the containers to other planets . Finally, consumption and also production start up again but the difficulty of having guarantees on delivery times, in addition to the increase in rental prices, risk creating considerable difficulties for Made in Italy exports, especially to distant markets ». Balocco had decided to anticipate the preparation and packaging of panettone and pandoros destined for distant foreign markets, imagining an improvement in the situation at an international level. the denunciation of the Italian sector shows, on the other hand, that the problem persists and that without national and European intervention, “the recovery and a fundamental voice of our economy such as exports could be jeopardized”.