Amr Samadouny, the Secretary General of the Egyptian International Freight Forwarding Association (EIFFA) at the Cairo Chamber of Commerce, said that the Houthi group’s attacks in the Red Sea region did not have a significant effect on navigation in the Suez Canal.
Samadouny said that maritime and international transport operations are going on normally, especially after the international shipping company “Maersk” resumed using the Red Sea route to transport containers.
He said that the prices of imported goods should not be raised and that some importers should not take advantage of the crisis.
“The whole matter lasted only a few days, and during this period no containers entered Egypt, so the goods imported by Egypt were not affected by the crisis,” Samdouny said. “The Suez Canal has not been much affected by the change in the course of international shipping traffic, due to the security threats in the Red Sea.
Therefore, there has been no major impact, and the number of ships that changed their course is small.”
The Secretary General of EIFFA revealed that the number of ships that actually changed their course to cross the Cape of Good Hope route during the period was about 76 ships, which is a small percentage compared to the 2,128 ships that crossed the Suez Canal during the same period.
He said that the presence of international forces to protect navigation in the Red Sea will give confidence and reassurance to major shipping companies to return to navigation in the Suez Canal, as it is the shorter route, while the alternative route will increase the cost of shipping and lead to higher prices.
The Red Sea is the only route to the Suez Canal, which connects some of the world’s largest consumers of tradable goods in Europe with major suppliers in Asia.
The Suez Canal also accounts for about 12% of global trade, which represents 30% of the total global container traffic, and more than a trillion dollars worth of goods and around 80 million tonnes of grains pass through the Red Sea annually through the Suez Canal.
