Despite the entry of more budget airlines and cheap air fare, a local shipping firm remains optimistic about growth in the shipping industry especially with Saturday’s launching of its ninth vessel, MV Filipinas.
Chester Cokaliong, founder and chief executive officer of Cokaliong Shipping Lines Inc., said the ship was an investment of P180 million and created 50 additional jobs.
The roll-on-roll-off vessel, which was bought in Japan, would serve a large untapped market for the shipping industry in the Visayas and Mindanao, said Cokaliong, who is also this year’s Cebu Chamber of Commerce and Industry’s Entrepreneur of the Year awardee.
The 3,084-ton vessel with a cruising speed of 16 knots can carry 850 passengers.
It will add two more trip frequencies in Cokaliong’s Cebu-Osamiz-Iligan route, which is being served by MV Filipinas Ozamiz. Cokaliong has the most number of voyages to these areas.
At present MV Filipinas Ozamiz travels to Cebu-Ozamiz-Iligan every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. The new vessel adds two more schedules on Friday and Sunday.
Cokaliong said the firm focused on this route because of its large volume of passengers and cargo traffic.
“Even with budget airlines, travel by sea is still the cheapest and most convenient way of traveling in the country because airlines have limitations when it comes to weight of cargo and the number of passengers,” Cokaliong said.
“This is where shipping companies come in because we have bigger capacities than airplanes.”
He said the shipping firm still had full bookings for their other vessels on different routes.
In terms of revenue, an equal contribution is made by passengers ticket sales and cargo, he said.
“This vessel arrived here last April 27 and we have been working on it since then. This is our biggest vessel and perhaps the first in Cebu with three auxillary engines. It also has four main engines. A standard vessel would just have two each, two auxiliary and two main engines but we have more,” he said.
In 2007, Cokaliong invested P220 million to acquire MV Filipinas Cebu.
Two years after, the firm bought another vessel MV Filipinas Ozamiz for P250 million.
Cokaliong said these continued investments would show the firm’s confidence in the shipping industry, which Cokaliong described as the backbone of the Philippine economy because it provides linkages that spur more tradingin the islands.
Up ahad, Cokaliong said he plans to field ships to major ports that are not yet served sach as Nasipit, Butuan and Cagayan de Oro.
“This will not be our last vessel,” Cokaliong said.
Cokaliong Shipping plies routes serving Cebu, Surigao, Maasin, Dumaguete, Dapitan, Sindangan, Tagbilaran, Iloilo, Larena, Palompon, Iligan, Ozamiz, Baybay and Calbayog.