Ships calling at Guangzhou and several other Chinese ports are finding local pilots in short supply and facing additional waits both upon arrival and at departure.
Waits of nearly two weeks for compulsory pilotage have been reported at Guangzhou, where a 21-day cycle of hotel and home confinement is in effect for pilots who board foreign-trading or foreign-crewed vessels.
Some shipowners with vessels calling recently at Guangzhou understand the pilot shortage as a local phenomenon, but portside sources in Shanghai and Zhoushan told TradeWinds that the pilot shortage is a result of local approaches to enforcing broader national Covid-19 quarantine policies.
The national rules in themselves date back to May, when scattered Covid-19 cases led to fears of a renewed outbreak.
But the head of China operations for one prominent international port agency said the local implementation has had a cumulative effect.
The Shanghai-based port agency official, who spoke on condition that he and his company not be named, told TradeWinds that the specific implementation of national policy is being left to regional port stations, and that Guangzhou has worked out a quarantine regime for the area that has been used as a model by local pilot stations in other regions including Shanghai.
For 14 days, pilots at Guangzhou who are boarding foreign-crewed ships or vessels that arrive from abroad must live in strict confinement, travelling in supervised vehicles from pilot launches to lockdown hotels. After that period, they spend seven days in home quarantine before repeating the cycle.
The Guangzhou Port Pilot Company, which is in charge of pilotage at Pearl River Delta ports including Zhuhai, Shenzhen, Zhongshan and Dongguan as well as Guangzhou proper, could not be reached for comment.
An official of the Zhoushan Port Authority, who also did not want to be identified, said a similar system is in place in that East China port and shipyard hub. Special efforts are being made two days per week to clear the backlog of waiting ships that need compulsory pilotage in order to get to their shipyard berths.
One shipowner has changed his chartering practices in response to the unexpected delays.
CC Hsu of Taiwan's Eddie Steamship said his 63,400-dwt Ocean Conqueror (built 2018) arrived at Guangzhou in October with a cargo of cement clinker from Vietnam and waited for 13 days before a pilot could be assigned, and for a shorter period while waiting for compulsory pilotage out of the port. Local port agents told him that the reason was the Guangzhou pilot station's 21-day quarantine cycle for pilots.
The Ocean Conqueror was on voyage charter rather than time charter, leaving Eddie Steamship with nobody to pay for the extra days spent waiting.
"Since then, we have changed our voyage charter terms," Hsu said. "We have added a new clause that says in case of delays in getting a pilot, only the first three days are for the owner's expense, and the charterer is responsible for anything longer than that."
He said Eddie Steamship often trades in the region and has another ship due to call in Guangzhou in late November for a dry-docking procedure.
