Regional liberalisation issues will put pressure on the shipping and logistics industry in the next few years, while this year is expected to be the most difficult, a logistics expert said last week.

The ASEAN fact sheets are as follows:

1. Local logistics service pro-viders will be forced to deal with stiffer competition as a result |of market liberalisation," said |Assoc Prof Ruth Banomyong, director of the Centre for Logistics Research, Thailand.
If the economy is not going |well, users might reduce their demand for global contracts, prompting international service providers to shift their focus to the local market
2. As a member of Asean, Thailand needs to open all modes in its transport and logistics sector - air, rail, road, inland water, and ports and maritime, he said.
3. Policies for the Asean logistics sector roadmap need to promote the integration of Asean national logistics systems, progressive liberalisation of logistics services, increased trade, logistics and investment facilitation, and mul-timodal transport capacity, he |said.
4. Airfreight transport services were designed to open last month and rail and road freight transport services last year. There is no deadline.
5. The other logistics services such as maritime cargo handling, storage and warehousing, freight transport agency, courier, packaging, and custom clearance services were set to be opened by 2013.
6. In terms of Asean rail transport issues, there is still a lack of double tracks, no dedicated tracks for rail freight services, some private freight train operations, some container train operations, no centralised or advanced train control system, and limited intermodal facilities.
7. For Asean road transport, even Thailand would benefit from the East-West Corridor highway linking northern Burma to Vietnam via Thailand and Laos. But there are still some infrastructure problems in newer member countries, high costs in many inland areas, truck bans in major cities, and insufficient harmonised rules and regulations.
8. Thai trucks can run in Laos but are banned in Vietnam and Vietnamese trucks can drive in |Laos but not in Thailand, while Laos has no trucks of its own.
In this case, Thai carriers could operate truck services in Laos by setting up a joint venture with local transport firms there. However, Japan's logistics firms are now operating truck carriage services in Laos.
9. For Asean inland water transport, there was limited usage, services are not fully computerised, and port facilities are not as advanced as seaports.
Asean ports and maritime is probably the most developed mode of transport in the region, with strong mainline connections and relative high level of IT usage, but this varies among countries.
10. The outlook for ship owners, shipyards and ship-owning nations is quite bleak. There is a clear oversupply of dry bulk carriers. "Traders and providers of transport services can do rather little against the fluctuations in freight costs as the industry is in the free market. They cannot control their service prices.
11. Demand for more integrated services will be a trend for logistics service providers.