Safmarine announces new Far East-East Africa shipping service

New Mashariki Express to commence March 2nd, 2010 Safmarine says it will further improve its Far East to East African shipping network with the introduction, in March, of a new, direct, fully-containerized shipping service from Far East to East Africa.

The new service, which will be known as the Mashariki* Express, offers improved transit times and reliability and will replace the existing ‘Mombasa Express’ service.

The new service will be launched on March 2, 2010 with the sailing of the 2,496 TEU Safmarine Zambezi from Mombasa in Kenya to Tanjung Pelepas in the Far East. According to Safmarine’s Eastern Africa Manager, John Lim, “The Mashariki Express offers a number of benefits to both importers and exporters. Benefits to importers include shorter transit from the Far East to Mombasa (Kenya) and Dar es Salaam (Tanzania) with preferred berthing in both Mombasa and Tanjung Pelepas.

Exporters, in turn, benefit from the weekly calls from both Mombasa and Dar es Salaam to Tanjung Pelepas, improved schedule reliability (a buffer has been included to accommodate possible berthing delays) and preferred berthing in Mombasa and Tanjung Pelepas.”<Korea Shipping Gazette>