The world merchant fleet in 2014
EMSA issuedEquasis annual report 2014 providing a picture of the worlds merchant fleet in 2014, derived from data contained in the Equasis database. It examines the structure and characteristics of the fleet and its performance.
The Equasis fleet is dominated (81%) by small and medium sized ships up to 24.999 GT. Small ships alone represent 36% by number, although less than 1% by tonnage.
Tugs (19.6%), general cargo ships (19.1%), oil and chemical tankers (14.5%) and bulk carriers (12.9%) are the most common ship types by number, representing about two thirds of the Equasis fleet. Most of these are small and medium sized ships.
In the large and very large categories, bulk carriers (30.7%), oil and chemical tankers (29.5%) and container ships (22.9%) represent about 85% of the fleet in number.
In terms of tonnage, the large and very large size categories represent 80% of the Equasis fleet, with oil and chemical tankers, bulk carriers, and container ships dominating both categories at 86.1% (large) and 83.1% (very large) respectively.
Total number of ships, by age and size
(Click on the image for a larger view)
The above table shows an almost even distribution of the Equasis fleet, by number, of ships under and over 15 years of age. However, there is a large dominance of older ships in the small and medium ship size categories. The trend is reversed in the large and very large ship size categories, where 84.2% (large) and 84.2% (very large) are less than 15 years old.
The most modern fleets are made up of the biggest ships in tonnage. Looking back at the statistics of the previous years, it is clear that theyounger ships are bigger than their predecessors. This trend continues each year. The statistics show that the biggest ships are recent additions to the fleet.
Over a third (34%) of the total number of ships are associated with a targeted flag State. Graphs 15 to 20 reveal a downwards trend of ships under a targeted flag State according to size: 36% for the medium sized ship category, 30% for the large category and 27% for the very large.
For the targeted flag States, general cargo ships are the most common ship category in number (30.3%), but bulk carriers are the most common ship type category by tonnage (44%). This is expected considering that these two ship types are the most common with respect to the total number of ships and tonnage (19.1% and 35.1%, respectively).
In comparison, oil and chemical tankers (21.6%), bulk carriers (18.3%), and general cargo ships (17.8%), have a larger proportion of the total number of ships originating from non-targeted flag States.
You may view the report by clicking below:
Source: EMSA
