Suez Canal- World's busiest trade route blocked

  • On 23rd March 2021, a massive cargo ship, named Ever Given, turned sideways in Egypt's Suez Canal. 
  • The ship appeared to be stuck some 6 kilometers north of the southern mouth of the canal near the city of Suez.
  • This blocked traffic in the crucial East-West waterway for global shipping.
  • About 64 vessels traveling southbound were also affected.  
  • All these vessels are stuck in transit between the Red Sea and the Mediterranean.
MV EVER GIVEN
  • The vessel blocking Suez, the Ever Given was a Panama-registered container ship.
  • It was on its way to Rotterdam in the Netherlands from China. 
  • The 2018-built vessel, which is 400-m long and 59-m wide, got stuck due to a mishap caused by bad weather.
  • The ship is operated by Evergreen Marine, a Taiwanese transport company.
THE SUEZ CANAL
  • It was opened in 1869. 
  • It connects Red Sea to the Mediterranean Sea and separates Sinai Peninsula from mainland Africa. 
  • The Suez Canal provides a crucial link for oil, natural gas and cargo being shipped from East to West. 
  • It is 193 kilometres long and is one of the most trafficked waterways in the world. 
  • It is Uuilized by oil tankers shipping crude from the Middle East to Europe and North America. 
IMPORTANCE OF THE CANAL
  • About 12% of global trade passes through the Suez canal.
  • Goods worth $9.6 billion pass through the canal every day. 
  • About $5.1 billion of that traffic is westbound and $4.5 billion is eastbound.
IMPACT ON INDIA
  • India is the top importer of crude oil and products via the Suez Canal, higher than China, South Korea or Singapore, according to data from Vortexa, an oil and gas analytics platform. 
  • More than two-thirds of India’s crude comes from the Gulf region.
  • India imports around 500,000 barrels per day of crude products via the Suez Canal, followed by China, which imports just above 400,000 barrels per day.
  • For India, the main hit could be seen on the import and export of ethane with the US, and The imports of crude from Latin America, the uptake of which was recently increased.

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