Slight Decline for Singapore's 2013 Annual Bunker Sales

Singapore increased its vessel traffic and cargo throughput in 2013

Annual bunker sales at the Port of Singapore saw a slight decline in 2013 to 42.5 million tonnes, compared with 42.7 million tonnes in 2012, the Singapore Maritime and Port Authority (MPA) has reported.

It is the second consecutive year there has been a slight reduction in the bunker sales volume at the port, which hit a record high of 43.2 million tonnes in 2011.

But the reduction in volume did not come with a reduction in importance for the hub.

"Singapore remained the world's top bunkering port in 2013," MPA said.

The official breakdown of the sales volumes in the final month of 2013 is not yet released, but the annual figure means the total for all products in December was around 3.6 million tonnes, the same as it was 12 months ago.

"Annual sales may have been relatively flat year-on-year, but what's encouraging is that sales in the second half of 2013 were much stronger than the second half of 2012 - it looks like they were the highest half year sales since H1 2012 in fact," an industry source told Ship & Bunker.

Overall, the port reported "good growth in 2013," as measures of vessel traffic and cargo throughput for 2013 all rose.

Arrival tonnage was up 3.2 percent to 2.33 billion gross tonnes (GT), container throughput rose 2.9 percent to 32.6 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEU), and total cargo tonnage was up 3.6 percent to 557.5 million tonnes.

The tonnage of ships flying the Singapore flag rose by 13.2 percent, bringing the Singapore Registry of Ships to 73.6 million GT at the end of December 2013, which the MPA noted put Singapore among the world's top 10 ship registries.