Modern Challenges for International Sea Freight

Abstract

The article highlights the new realities in the international freight transportation emerged under the simultaneous challenges, related to the global economic crisis, climate change and the COVID-19 pandemic consequences. The authors argue that the seaborn trade has been encountering a fundamental disorders a long before the contemporary global shocks emergence. Additionally the global container crisis, caused by the shortage of free containers and its growing costs has made the whole situation in the international freight transportation worse, causing the delivery time extention and the growth of inflation. The article is aimed on the identification of the most challenging problems in theory and decision makings, encountering the international freight turnover. Analysing the breakthrough research, expertise and applying the new methodological findings the authors of the articleargue the prospective transformation of the international logistics and proposing new framing features for the global supply chaing configuration. The article states the most undermining processes for the international feight turnover such as the global economic crisis, from its beginning in 2008, the enforcement of the international trade contradictions, specifically US-China trade war, ecological degradation, climate change and the global supply chain disruption, enforced by the global container crisis. The unique role of China as the preconditioning chain in the global supply of the commodities, parts and assembiles was revealed as the most risky factor for the business and governments in all over the world. The article concludes that the global system of international seaborn freight transportation has been entering into the epoch of profound transformation. The foresighting about the main direction of that transformation could be meaningful for Russia and the elaboration of its national transportation strategy.