Santa Marina Now a Member of CIFA "China International Freight Forwarder Assosiation" 
Founded in Beijing on September 6th, 2000, China International Freight Forwarders Association (hereinafter CIFA) is a national agent organization of international freight forwarding industry. It is a social group that all provincial and municipal freight forwarders guilds, international freight forwarding enterprises and enterprises related to freight forwarding can voluntarily join, and it also accepts influential individuals in freight forwarding industry, transportation and logistics field. Now, CIFA has over 500 members (including 24 local international freight forwarders associations from each province, city or autonomous region as group members), including 97 council members and 48 standing council members.
CIFA’s business is under the guidance of the Ministry of Commerce. As a tie and bridge between government and members, CIFA’s tenet is: to assist the government to enforce the regulation of our freight forwarding industry; to maintain the business order of international freight forwarding industry; to promote the communication and cooperation among the member enterprises; to safeguard the interests of the industry according to law; to protect members legal rights and to boost the development of foreign trade and international freight forwarding industry; and on behalf of China’s freight forwarding industry; CIFA, as a non-governmental organization, takes part in international trade and transportation affairs and carries out international commercial intercourses, and attends all kinds of related international meetings.
During the last five years since its foundation, CIFA has done a lot of work acting as media between government and enterprises in listening and reporting freight forwarding enterprises’ voices and firmly safeguarding their legal rights.
CIFA receives credits and approval from government, freight forwarding enterprises as well as from all other circles of the society for its pioneering contribution in promoting the development of freight forwarding industry.
Zim narrows Q3 loss 20pc to US$63 million from $79 million lost in Q2
ISRAEL's Zim Integrated Shipping has narrowed its loss in the third quarter by 20 per cent to US$63 million from the $79 million loss it made in the second quarter.
There were significant improvement in operations, said the company. Although third quarter revenue was $973 million, less than the $1 billion raised in the previous quarter, the Zim improved its cash flow from a negative level of $7 million in second quarter to a positive level of $23 million in the third quarter, noted the UK's Transport Intelligence.
Zim shipped 646,000 TEU in the third quarter, compared to 596,000 TEU in the previous quarter, up eight per cent month on month and year on year.
It was able to maintain a stable price at an average $1,311 per TEU between the second and third quarters. But the carrier said prices will continue to be soft in the last quarter as overcapacity has deteriorated the supply-demand imbalance.
Another reason for operating losses is the high bunker prices, which also contributed to the company's continued losses. The average market price of bunker was $650 a ton in the third quarter, compared to an average of $463 a ton in the same period of 2010. Zim expects fuel prices will stay high in the fourth quarter.
Looking ahead, the carrier said it has secured new funds of $100 million from the Israel Corp and Ofer Group to carry out long-term business plan.
UN and IMO urge better naval co-ordination to fight Somali piracy PIRACY off Somalia requires better naval coordination, says the UN's International Maritime Organisation (IMO) secretary-general Efthimios Mitropoulos.
The presence of naval activity has dampened activity in the Gulf of Aden and off the east coast of Somali with a drop in successful pirates attacks of 20 per cent year on year.
The UN Security Council has also urged countries to coordinate efforts in order to seize "vessels and any other equipment used to carry out acts of maritime piracy, or for which there is reasonable ground to suspect that they will be put to such use".
Political intervention is needed to secure hostage release, said IMO, adding that a further review of IMO guidelines on compliance to fight piracy and deeper co-ordination of navies and states to fight will be carried out.
The threat still hangs over seafarers who are "going about their daily business in ships wrapped in razor wire in a state of constant wariness as they run the gauntlet of pirate gangs," said Mr Mitropoulos.
THE British International Freight Association has announced in its newsletter that the introduction of the new European Union's Customs Code has been delayed.
"Implementing provisions for the Modernised Customs Code (MCC) are likely to be delayed beyond the current target date of June 2013," it said.
The objectives of the Modernised Customs Code are to enhance security at the EU's external borders and facilitate trade. That requires the simplification of customs legislation and the streamlining of customs procedures, using modern tools and technology to support the uniform application of customs legislation. For the purpose of both customs formalities and customs controls, paper-based information and processing would be only used under exceptional circumstances," BIFA said.
"A recent assessment of the state of definition of the customs processes to be computerised and of the technical and financial capacity of stakeholders to develop and deploy electronic systems for the purposes of the Modernised Customs Code, concluded that a very limited number of new systems can be introduced by the current target date of June 2013," the newsletter said.