We've spent most of this year focused on the Gulf of Aden and the piracy risk on our Somalia route, but it isn't the only part of the region worth watching closely. Unrest that started in Tunisia back in December has spread further than anyone predicted at the time — Egypt saw its government change hands in February, and now Libya and Syria are both seeing serious internal conflict take hold. None of these are markets we're shipping into directly yet, but that doesn't mean they're irrelevant to us.
Regional instability has a way of moving through a shipping network even when it doesn't touch your own route directly. Insurance underwriters price risk across whole regions, not just individual ports, so unrest in one corner of the Middle East tends to nudge premiums upward more broadly, ourselves included. Freight forwarders also reroute vessels and adjust schedules based on where they expect trouble, which can mean longer transit times even for cargo headed somewhere calm.
For now, our approach is simply to stay informed rather than to overreact. We're a small company keeping a close eye on a rapidly changing part of the world, and 2011 has already taught us that conditions here can shift within weeks. Whatever comes of this unrest in the months ahead, we'd rather be watching it early than catching up to it later.
