Industrial shipments
employ high class tonnage

In Finland, the export industry has a firm grip on its transports. A significant part of all short sea shipments from Finland are operated directly or indirectly by Finnish industrial operators. In some cases the industry also plays an active role in constructing new vessels and creating transport solutions.

The strong connection between Finland’s export industry and the Finnish merchant fleet has a long history. Due to Finland’s geographical location, many of the surrounding sea areas and particularly the coastal waters are covered in ice in winter, which reduces the possibilities to find suitable vessels for charter on the market.

To ensure sufficient, year-round transport capacity, the industry has been forced to establish long term co-operation with owners of suitable ice strengthened vessels. The owner may invest in a modern ice strengthened vessel when he in exchange gets a long term charter contract.

For hundreds of years, Finnish shipping has been about transporting forest industry products. First there was tar for the mighty fleets of wooden naval ships, later wood for the growing mining industry and finally woodpulp and paper for the fast expanding print industry.

During the age of wooden sailing vessels, all shipping activities ceased when the sea started to freeze. Towards the end of the 19th century, shipbuilding and propulsion technology had enabled the design of ice going vessels. The first year-round liner service was opened from the port of Hanko – the southernmost port in Finland – which usually stays free of ice longer than any other port.

Real winter services were enabled by means of icebreaker assistance. At the end of the 1890’s, Finland took delivery of its first ice breaker and the fleet was rapidly enlarged in the beginning of the 20th century. In combination with stronger hulls and more powerful machinery on merchant vessels and the rapid development of ice breaking technology, an increasing number of Finnish ports could be kept open for traffic throughout the year. When a new generation of powerful icebreakers were delivered in the 1970’s, even the northern ports could be kept open virtually throughout the winter. Today year-round shipping services from all major ports are a basic part of the Finnish industry’s transport system.

System traffic
Both forest and steel industry have established seamless co-operation mainly with Finnish but also with some foreign shipowners, to ensure the supply of suitable transport capacity during all seasons.

Forest industry is the backbone of all Finnish industrial production. It is no surprise that the Finnish forest industry has assumed a leading role in applying new concepts and ideas in sea transports of, above all, paper.

This would not have been possible without a number of smaller shipping companies, specialised in short sea shipping. A concept called “system traffic” was created to form a basic transport network, independent of existing liner connections.

In typical system traffic, the forest industry itself took a number of modern vessels on time charter and operated them exclusively for their own cargoes. Usually they sailed westward loaded with paper and pulp, and returned to Finland in ballast. The products were shipped to a limited number of ports, mainly on the continent and in the UK, for further distribution to the market areas.

Although a major part of the forest industry’s own system shipments nowadays have evolved into pure liner traffic, system traffic is still a complement to other forms of sea transports, such as liner services and shipments based on volume contracts.

Transfennica in the forefront of development
The transport organisation Transfennica, founded by several Finnish forest industry enterprises in the late 1970’s, has made a massive effort in developing tailor made tonnage for the export of forest industry products.

Today Transfennica operates a fleet of 14 fast ro-ro vessels built in the 1990’s. The vessels are all of basically the same design, called the fifth generation, and owned by Bror Husell Chartering, Rederi AB Engship, Birka Cargo, Godby Shipping, Sea-Trans and Ernst Russ. All of these owners have been co-operated with Transfennica for many years.

“Fifth generation” refers to the present development stage of forest industry product carriers within Transfennica, spanning over two decades. Since the beginning of the 1980’s, Transfennica has been the driving force in the development of a number of different types of ro-ro vessels. There are distinct stages in the development, the newest vessels representing the fifth stage.

Close co-operation with the shipowners has been of great importance in realising the projects.
– Long term co-operation is important for both parties, as it is essential to transfer the experiences from the previous generation of vessels to the next one, states Mr. Rolf G. W. Eriksson, Managing Director of Transfennica Ltd.
– It is a drawn-out learning process and if an owner has been with us during an earlier generation it is much easier to take an active role in developing the next generation and also to understand the entire concept.

Regarding financial and other aspects, each owner has not been participating in the development of every generation of vessels.

Did the “impossible”
When Transfennica started developing the fifth generation of vessels, there was wide-spread scepticism about the concept both in shipping and industry.

Mr. Eriksson recalls that at first the shipyards said it would be impossible to combine the required width with the specified capacity for deck cargo. It was also considered impossible by experts to operate a ro-ro vessel in weekly service with the actual cargoes from Rauma to Antwerp.
– Still we have done so for six years now but, of course, a lot of work had to been done before that, says Mr. Eriksson.

Today many ro-ro vessels are built to a similar concept both regarding general arrangement and performance. The “Transfennica standard” includes many of the key factors typical for modern ro-ro vessels in short sea traffic, such as a separate ramp and stern door to the upper deck, wide access to the main deck and lower hold simultaneously, large cargo capacity on weather deck and high service speed.
– One driving factor in our development work has been the fact that it is impossible to operate shipping with the existing cost level in Finland without being increasingly efficient all the time, because the freight level has remained unchanged, comments Mr. Eriksson on the development.

What about a “sixth generation”?

Mr. Eriksson points out that there is no need to hurry the launch of the next type of Transfennica vessels.
– We are in the fortunate situation that the accumulated know-how has resulted in an extremely good type of vessel: the fifth generation. The concept is uncomplicated, allows for fast sto-ro handling of paper reels in the holds and the vessels are ideal for carrying both trailers and large volumes of containers.

Minimum life span ten years
However, Mr. Eriksson admits that a sixth generation is to come. There are already discussions within the company about what the next steps in the development might be.
– We don’t feel any pressure to start working with new ideas, but internally we are already discussing what the aim will be for Transfennica’s next generation of forest industry product carriers.

The shift from one generation of vessels to the next also has to accommodate possible changes in business operations during the expected life span of the vessels.
– Our aim in the design is that the vessels should have a minimum life span of ten years in our traffic, both from a technical and an economic point of view, states Mr. Eriksson.

He stresses that the vessels may be operated successfully for a much longer time.
– If we have succeeded in our design work, the owner has the possibility to sell a modern and efficient vessel on the market for a fair price, giving him the possibility to make a new investment.
The vessels designed for Transfennica’s traffic have proven to be most useful also for other operators. Worth mentioning is that, after Transfennica’s charter, three vessels of the fourth generation – the Birka Cargo owned sisters Hamnö, Granö and Styrsö – have been upgraded and put into traffic for the Swedish forest industry group Korsnäs.

In-house systems
When Transfennica started its operations, it was all about system traffic. In the 1990’s, development has shifted towards pure liner traffic and today Transfennica is a typical liner operator with scheduled sailings.

Still, most of the export industry’s transports are of the system type, completely developed around the industry’s cargoes. On some occasions, external cargoes are also carried.
The forest industry enterprise UPM Kymmene operates a fleet of six vessels on time charter in its own system traffic. Three of them are ro-ro vessels owned by Godby Shipping Group. UPM Kymmene also uses regular ro-ro liner traffic for shipping its products, such as Finnlines and Transfennica.
– Our own system traffic is in a way a complement and the destinations are in areas outside the major ro-ro liner network, says Mr. Altti Moilanen of UPM Kymmene Seaways.

The system traffic is built on the group’s own cargo flow, but other cargo is also carried. In system traffic, export is combined with the group’s own import of bulk goods for production.

Transport development
The steel manufacturer Rautaruukki has built up extensive system traffic. The transport functions within the group are handled by the subsidiary JIT-Trans.
For the moment JIT-Trans employs nine lo-lo vessels on time charter for its outgoing product shipments. The backbone of the fleet is formed by five vessels owned by Langh Ship. These vessels mainly carry products from Rautaruukki’s factories, loading in Raahe, Lappohja and Koverhar. JIT-Trans also carries cargo for AvestaPolarit, loading in Tornio – the northernmost sea port in Finland.

Langh Ship has done an extensiv developing work, improving the shipment methods for steel. Four of Langh Ships’ vessels have been equipped with a special tween deck for carrying part of the steel coil load, making the vessels less stiff in sea. With an alternative distribution of the cargo on board the vessel, the rolling in bad weather has decreased and the rolling periods have become considerably longer. After that there has no longer been any damage on the cargo on these vessels.

Recently Langh Ship has also introduced several new types of 20 foot containers, developed especially for carrying steel plates and small coils in short sea shipping.
Now the first batch of 20 containers are going to be taken into test use. European Commission has granted PACT funding for the development of these cargo units.
– The large shipments volumes for JIT-Trans and a long term co-operation has made it possible for us to develop new methods for safer shipments of steel products, says the shipowner Hans Langh.

Pär-Henrik Sjöström

Back to SSG 1, 25 January