Shipping companies offer more choice at sea

By PAM GRAHAM

Shipping companies are continuing to increase services to and from New Zealand, most recently with Asia.

Tasman Orient is expanding its service and upgrading vessels on routes between New Zealand and Asia.

Maersk Sealand has again chartered two container ships to bolster services to the Tanjung Pelepas hub port in Malaysia during the peak export season from next month.

Tasman Orient ships carry both containerised and non-containerised freight. The company is putting two newer and faster vessels on its East Asia service, which will call at Bluff.

The Tasman Provider started service on February 10 and the Tasman Endeavour starts on Wednesday.

Tasman Orient's Southeast Asia service will have a third vessel, the Tasman Explorer, which is shifting from the East Asia run. It will improve service frequency from 23 days to 15 days.

The North Asia service is aligning with the East Asia service.

Maersk has chartered the Marivia and Westemoor to provide an additional six fortnightly sailings from Tauranga, Nelson, Napier and Auckland during the peak export season.

Last year P&O Nedlloyd implemented its new fixed-day weekly service to Europe using huge container ships, and MSC included New Zealand on its European services.