After China, in 2018 the port and trading hub Singapore was the Port of Hamburg’s second strongest partner country for seaborne container handling. The number of containers transported between the two ports reached 380,000 TEU. A total of 4.3 million tons of seaborne cargo were transported between Hamburg and Singapore in 2018. In the first nine months of 2019, container transport between Hamburg and Singapore rose to 305,000 TEU, a 4.1 percent advance on the same period of 2018. Handling 36.6 million TEU in 2018, after Shanghai, Singapore is the world’s second largest port for seaborne container handling. Singapore’s port functions as a vital trading hub for further distribution of freight in the region. For instance, freight traded in direct container traffic between Hamburg and Singapore is transhipped there to neighbouring countries in the region. At present, 15 liner services connect the Port of Hamburg with Singapore, nine for containers and six for general cargo. Some of these also accept heavy and wheeled cargo.
“The Trade Agreement between the EU and Singapore will also produce additional upswing for seaborne foreign trade in the Port of Hamburg and benefit national economies in the EU and Singapore,” says Axel Mattern, Joint CEO of Port of Hamburg Marketing. Singapore is a hub for the countries of the rapidly growing SE Asian region.