(by Michela Di Carlo) Nine containers at sea, for weeks without a certain destination. Tiles left from Italy and ended up transiting between Sri Lanka, India and Malaysia before arriving in Oman. Delays of up to four months, insurance canceled and shipping costs more than doubled. It is the snapshot of the logistical crisis experienced in recent months by Caterina Carannante, the first Western entrepreneur registered in Oman since 2009 and founder, in 2011, of the only showroom in the country entirely dedicated to Made in Italy ceramics. "We woke up one morning and we had nine containers at sea. For the first few weeks we couldn't understand where they were, what route they would take and how to recover them," he says.
For over a decade the logistics chain functioned according to consolidated patterns, then from February, with the war and the closure of Hormuz, the crisis of the maritime routes changed everything. "I was tracking the ships and I saw our containers arrive in Sri Lanka, then go up the coast of India, stop, go back. It was a completely unpredictable situation." The goods leaving from the Italian ports of Genoa and La Spezia, instead of following the usual routes, began to circumnavigate Africa. In some cases, Carannante says, the delays have reached four months.
Other shipments arrived two months after the expected delivery date.
The crisis had an immediate impact on costs. “To recover some of the containers we incurred additional expenses of up to five thousand dollars for each shipment, depending on the size.” Ordinary rates have also increased: "Before the crisis, for the international route alone, a container could cost around 1,600 dollars. Today we are around 3,500".
One of the main problems then became the port of Sohar, a traditional hub for goods heading to the Sultanate and an important logistical and industrial hub halfway between Dubai and Muscat, now congested. "We had a ship that remained offshore for about ten days, a few minutes of navigation from the coast, simply because there was no free dock," explains Carannante. Hence the decision to change company logistics: new shipments are directed to the port of Salalah, in southern Oman, and then transferred by land. A choice that reduces uncertainty by sea but resulted in a final distance of over a thousand kilometres.
"We transport containers by land that can weigh up to 25 tons and which contain fragile material. It is clear that this is not the ideal logistical condition. In some cases, land transport costs more than the Italy-Salalah shipment."
Among the most complex episodes of recent months is that of two containers destined for an important real estate project. "The customer called me continuously but I couldn't give a certain date: the material was already in Oman and yet we couldn't recover it." To further complicate the picture there is the insurance issue. "The company informed us that, retroactively from March 1st, the policy was canceled" because the ships' routes were war zones. "Since then it has been impossible to insure the goods normally. You have no guarantees on the time, the condition in which it will arrive and, above all, you have no protection in case it is lost."
For Carannante, the most significant change concerns daily work. "It's as if I were doing another job. Before, my job was to promote Made in Italy, select products, work with customers. Today a large part of the day is dedicated to resolving logistical emergencies." "I don't think we'll go back to the previous situation any time soon. Maybe we'll have to get used to a new normality, but beyond our small interest in tiles, there are much bigger ones. I want to believe that sooner or later a new balance will be found", is the entrepreneur's hope.
