The turbulence of the past year has in many ways clouded the underlying fundamentals in the dry bulk shipping market, but with 2020 now behind us, we are in a better position to establish an overview of expectations for 2021.
Overall, total tonnes transported by the dry bulk shipping industry fell by 1.3% to 5.49 billion tonnes, from 5.56b in 2019, which is however still higher than the 5.46b tonnes shipped in 2018. China has further cemented its position as the dominant player in dry bulk shipping with its imports now accounting for just shy of 50% of the market when measured in tonne-miles.
This overall drop in tonnes marks discrepencies between different dry bulk commodities. Of the three main commodity grous: iron ore, coal and agriculture, coal is the only one to have fallen; down 102.2 million tonnes from last year (-7.4%)…
