Shortage accounts for more cargo claims than realised, warns Swedish Club

Despite the many and varied categories of cargo damage faced by shipowners transporting grain cargoes, when it comes to claims it is actually cargo shortage that they need to be prepared for, warned The Swedish Club, in its guide "Bulker Focus: Carriage of grains and soya beans". In the last five years, the Club's statistics show that shortage was the most common type of claim for bulkers carrying grains, contributing to 63 per cent of all claims. About 70 per cent of these shortage claims occured due to discrepancies between the vessel's figures and shore figures with most claims arising in North Africa during the five-year period as a whole.