More cargo travelling by sea

The overseas cargo loaded (exports) and unloaded (imports) at New Zealand ports increased in bothweight and value during the year ended June 2007, Statistics New Zealand said today.

The percentagevalue increase exceeded the percentage weight increase for both exported and imported cargo, with risesin sea-freight leading all of these increases.

Logs, wood and wood articles, particularly pine logs, dominated the weight increase in export cargo – thefirst annual increase in total export cargo weight since 2003 – while dairy produce led the increase in value.

The weight increase in import cargo was led by the fertiliser and animal feed groups, while mineral fuelswere the largest contributor to the value increase.

For all of the mentioned commodity groups, sea-freightaccounted for at least 99.5 percent of cargo, by both weight and value.

Although the value of air-freighted export cargo increased by almost 5 percent in the year ended June 2007,the weight actually fell by 2.3 percent.

By weight, the most air-freighted commodity group was fish,crustaceans and molluscs.

The largest contributor to this was salmon – two-thirds of all salmon exportswere air-freighted.

Air-freight accounted for only 6.6 percent of fish, crustacean and mollusc exports byweight, but almost a quarter by value