Container Transshipment – Basic Definitions

Blogger - Chetan Pandey

Transshipment is broadly defined as the act of shipping containers to an intermediary destination prior to reaching their eventual destination. Typically (though not always) transshipment of containers is the most economic option for the shipping lines to move containers from one point to another.

There are various terminologies that have been floating around in the container domain and I intend to use this forum to educate readers on the same through analogies:

Transshipment Terminology	Definition	Example - Mumbaikars
Transit	Transit may be defined as movement of containers from the hinterland through sea/ inland waterway mode (barges) to the ocean going vessel. The container per se is called as transit container. Even other wise all containers destined to the hinterland across multiple modes may be designated as transit containers. Containers that are loaded onto barges in the Hoogly river for further unloading / loading operations at Haldia may be considered as containers in transit.	For Mumbaikars a travel from home to office and vice versa can be considered as ‘containers in transit’.
Interlining	Interlining may be defined as movement of a container between two or more parallel running services operated either by one shipping line or a consortium of shipping lines serving different ports between originating and destination ports in such a manner that weekly service at each of the intermediate ports is maintained. Port of Singapore, Port Said etc are ports where interlining takes place.	The classic example is that of movement of passengers in the Mumbai suburban train services. A passenger willing to move from Mahim to Virar would perhaps first take a slow local to Andheri and then a fast local to Virar (subject to crowd). The same passenger has the option of waiting for a slow train at Mahim, however, since the waiting time is high he boards the slow train at Mahim and switches over at Andheri reaching his final destination in the most optimal time. The passenger is embarked from Mahim on a slow local, transshipped at Andheri, and continues his journey from Andheri on a fast local. Both Mahim and Andheri are serviced at a set frequency and yet a passenger opts for transshipment!! Replacing the passenger with container and suburban train/s as container liners explains the phenomenon
Relay	Relay is a typical movement of container from a main line vessel to another main line vessel on a different route. Typically relay happens on a junction of two main lines routes. Las Palmas near West Africa is some sort of a meeting point of trade routes from South America-EU and EU-Singapore (via Cape of Good Hope)	Dadar station is Mumbai is a classic example of a Relay terminal. There are two main routes viz. CST-Kalyan and Churchgate-Borivali. Dadar is typically used when a passenger from Thane wishes to move to Bandra.
Feedering	Classic feedering is defined as transportation of containers on a smaller vessel from a smaller port to a hub port for further movement on a larger vessel. Typically feeder movements are short haul in nature as they are cost effective. Movement of containers from East coast of Indian sub continent (Kolkata/ Haldia/ Chittagong) to Port of Singapore is considered as Feedering.	In the current context of Mumbai suburban system, Feedering may be defined as movement of passengers from Colaba to CST/ Churchgate or for that matter movement of passengers from Worli to Dadar in BEST buses. Typically BEST buses are acting feeders to the suburban train network.

A container typically travels through various modes encompassing our definitions of Transit, Interlining, Relay and Feedering. Similarly a passenger also uses various modes for his movement.

The underlying criterion in both these cases is to achieve combination of cargo safety, optimal cost and time or it may be euphemistically called as ‘better service’.

For Mumbaikars - May be!!