Global supply chains are facing further disruption as the city of Shanghai extends its lockdown. The city went into a phased  lockdown on 28th March 2022 following a surge in COVID-19 cases.

As per the original plan, Chinese authorities put the Puxi district in the west of Shanghai into lockdown today (Friday 1st April). At present they have said this is planned to be lifted on 5th April. However, Pudong, the eastern side of the city, will remain in lockdown for a further seven days as the outbreak numbers have not decreased. Originally the Pudong lockdown had been planned to come to an end today.

As a result, Shanghai Pudong International Airport (PVG) located in the eastern half of the city, will not be able to accept cargo until the lockdown extensions have finished.

However, to overcome this, Uniserve has established an alternative warehouse in Hangzhou – just south of Shanghai – to allow us to continue to receive cargo from factories. From there we will be able to route freight to other airports of departure across the country.

Please be aware that there is a delay in the issue of bilateral landing permits between the UK/EU and China, which is resulting in significant flight cancellations in the next week. China Eastern, China Southern and China Airlines have all cancelled flights, which is having a huge impact on space availability in the coming week.

Meanwhile, Shanghai Port is facing major congestion, with five times as many vessels waiting to load as there were two weeks ago. Port operations in terms of loading are currently running at less than 80% of normal capability. Consequently, some shipping lines have decided to omit Shanghai, and some services have been announced to combine volume on one service from the port.

Demand may also be affected due to some factory closures, and we do expect the forthcoming 7-10 days to be challenging.

We encourage you to contact your Customer Development Manager on 01375 856060 or email crmteam@ugroup.co.uk to discuss any concerns.