Press Office
RWI/ISL Container Throughput Index: World trade grows strongly, Index reaches all-time high
Press release from 30 October 2020
The Container Throughput Index of the RWI - Leibniz Institute of Economic Research and the Institute of Shipping Economics and Logistics (ISL) continued to rise to 119.7 according to the current flash estimate, thus reaching an all-time high.
The most important results:
• The Container Throughput Index of the RWI - Leibniz Institute of Economic Research and the Institute of Shipping Economics and Logistics (ISL) continued to rise to 119.7 according to the current flash estimate, thus reaching an all-time high.
• Compared with the flash estimate, the August value has been revised upwards by 0.4 points.
• Traffic increased in Chinese ports, but also in the other ports around the world.
• The North Range Index, which gives an indication of the economic development in the northern euro zone and in Germany, improved to 111.6. The positive trend continues, but figures are still below the pre-crisis level.
• The current flash estimate for the Container Throughput Index is based on data from 64 ports, which account for about 85 percent of the handling represented in the index.
• The RWI/ISL Container Handling Index for October 2020 will be published on 24 November 2020.
Regarding the development of the container throughput index, RWI Chief Economist Torsten Schmidt comments: “The container traffic shows that world trade continues to expand strongly. It now even exceeds its pre-crisis level”.
About the RWI / ISL container handling index:
The index includes the data on container transhipment in 91 international ports, which are continuously collected by the ISL as part of its market observation and account for around 60 percent of global container transhipment. Since international trade is mainly handled by sea, container transhipments allow reliable conclusions to be drawn about world trade. Because many ports already report on their activities two weeks after the end of a month, the RWI/ISL Container Handling Index is a reliable early indicator of the development of international trade in processed goods and thus also of global economic activity.
Data series for individual ports are available in the ISL Monthly Container Port Monitor.
Further background information on the RWI/ISL Container Port Index can be found at www.rwi-essen.de/containerindex.
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Contact:
Leonard Goebel (press office), Tel.: (0201) 8149-210
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RWI/ISL Container Throughput Index: North Range
RWI/ISL Container Throughput Index: China and the rest of the world
Index Data (China and the rest of the world)