Over the past week, ports have seen a small wave of shipment activity, but the lives of container truck drivers are far from easy.
On September 19, the Ningbo Transportation Association and the Ningbo Logistics Association jointly issued a notice stating that recent sharp increases in diesel prices have caused fuel cost pressures for road container transport enterprises to surge, and the industry is facing significant operational challenges.
Over the past two weeks, Liang Sanbo, chairman of the Container Truck Transport Branch of the Ningbo Logistics Association, has been running around tirelessly. He told the reporters that Ningbo's container truck industry has fallen into full-scale losses, with independent drivers losing money on every single job. Liang Sanbo called for freight rates to be raised as soon as possible to accelerate the loss-reduction process and maintain market stability.
At Xiamen's Haicang Port Area, logistics boss Qu Kun (pseudonym), who runs European and American routes, operates a fleet of about a dozen people. "Right now there's just no business. Oil prices are too high, there are no containers to haul, and freight rates are stuck in a race to the bottom," Qu Kun said. Since last year, cargo sources have dropped significantly. If he wants to maintain drivers' incomes, he can only operate at a loss.
At 11 a.m. on September 11, Pier No. 4 at Shanghai's Waigaoqiao Port Area had not yet reached its inbound peak. Container truck drivers queuing at the yard to unload said that with more trucks and less cargo, it now takes two to three days to get a single job. Independent drivers with vehicle loans have no income when they can't find work, so they have to take low-priced jobs.
Inside and outside the ports, on one side there are soaring ocean freight rates and hard-to-book containers with comprehensive quotes running into tens of thousands of yuan, while on the other side there is the stark reality of container trucks at the docks where "not working means losses, and working also means losses."
In recent days, reporters visited port areas in multiple locations and found that the maritime supply chain is being torn open by geopolitical storms, creating a survival gap. There is a group of people who are the first to feel the chill of this massive upheaval, yet they have no bargaining power whatsoever.
Current Situation: Independent Drivers Lose 200 Yuan Per Trip
3 p.m. and 10 p.m. are the peak hours for container trucks entering Shanghai's outer port terminals. Old Zhang (pseudonym), who has manned the checkpoint for years, told reporters that to improve the long queuing situation, relevant road sections are being renovated, and additional checkpoints will be added in the future to ease the pressure of container truck entry and exit. "Usually there's a small shipping peak in the week before holidays. Cargo volume was relatively light in mid-September. Traffic flow depends on the size of arriving vessels and the number of containers loaded and unloaded," Old Zhang said.
Driver Xiao Chen (pseudonym), who handles less-than-container-load cargo, wolfed down a boxed meal on the roadside and was in a hurry to pick up his next job: "Business gets worse every year. I do more but there's barely any profit. Factories export with thin margins and high volume, and everyone from bulk cargo haulers to container truck drivers can't make money."
Eating at mobile food stalls and finding fixed spots for repairs are the most unremarkable parts of a container truck driver's daily routine, but nowadays these scattered expenses are enough to wipe out a day's profit. "When the market was good, even working for a fleet I could earn over 10,000 yuan a month. Now I've taken out a loan to buy my own truck, and my gross income is only about 20,000 yuan," said Master Wu, who was repairing a tire. He is an independent driver whose wife and children are in their hometown in Shandong. He is away year-round and cannot take care of his family, yet after calculating all costs over a year, he only takes home a net profit of fifty or sixty thousand yuan. A tire repair costs 50 yuan, an oil change every three months, annual insurance premiums are not cheap, and diesel prices are still rising... Master Wu's container truck handles short-haul jobs from the yard to the dock, with relatively fixed freight rates. Even running two or three trips a day, the high-intensity work does not bring high returns, and there is even the headache of delayed payments.
Liang Sanbo did the math for reporters: In Ningbo, about 80% of container trucks are affiliated vehicles, meaning the vehicles belong to independent drivers. Income consists of two parts: driving wages and property income. But the affiliation mechanism easily gives drivers the illusion that they can still break even. Now, rising oil prices are further squeezing the gross profit margin per trip. After factoring in insurance, depreciation, maintenance, and amortized residual value, a vehicle essentially loses 200 yuan per trip.
"If you lose money on every job, why does the industry still compete on price to take orders?" reporters asked. "Because independent drivers still have mortgage payments. They'd rather lose money than shut down their business," Liang Sanbo said helplessly. "Everyone can only tough it out and hope oil prices come down."
Causes: Rising Oil Prices, Falling Freight Rates, and Multiple Factors Shrinking Business Volume
On September 16, at Xiamen's Haicang Port Area, fleet owners were also crunching the same numbers. "Oil prices went from over 5 yuan per liter in June to over 7 yuan per liter now," said Boss Su, who runs a small fleet of seven or eight people. "What does a 2-yuan-per-liter increase mean? It means each container truck trip adds one to two hundred yuan in fuel costs." Boss Su lamented that the industry is too cutthroat, freight rates keep falling, and fuel costs have risen so much. Previously, a single trip could yield a gross profit of five or six hundred yuan; now it's only about one hundred yuan. Boss Su's logistics company is run jointly by him and his wife and is almost the entire family's source of income. "I can only maintain old clients. I don't dare take new orders because taking them means losing money. Everyone is holding on. Those who can't hold on get eliminated by the industry."
"If the decline in freight rates is due to insufficient cargo volume, why are there still trucks queuing at the docks?" reporters asked. Boss Su explained that yards are full not because there's a lot of cargo, but because similar containers are all dispatched to one place, and port opening times are relatively concentrated. All vehicles rush to the same location at the same time, making the queue look very long.
During the reporters' visits, multiple container truck industry workers mentioned that business volume has declined significantly. Industry insider Gao Qiang said that fundamentally, container truck capacity exceeds demand because the goods supporting export value are now the "new three" items that don't require container trucks, while light industrial products that need container truck transport are shrinking year by year. At the same time, barges and sea-rail intermodal transport are diverting some of the trailer cargo. Reporters learned that if zero-kilometer sea-rail transport is achieved, each container saves at least 200 yuan in short-haul costs.
Another reason is that fleets undercut each other to grab orders. "Freight rates have no bottom, only lower. If fuel trucks won't do it, electric trucks will. And there are trucks running around carrying cargo everywhere that have spoiled the freight forwarders." Some container truck drivers even said that it's all independent vehicles losing money, while affiliated fleets continue to take their cut. Why would they proactively seek rate increases from freight forwarders?
Freight Rate Standoff: Imbalanced Bargaining Power Among Independent Trucks, Fleets, and Freight Forwarders
Unlike self-owned fleets, affiliated fleets' income mainly comes from commissions on independent drivers' freight fees obtained by providing cargo sources. Liang Sanbo told reporters that the reason it's so hard to adjust prices in Ningbo's container truck industry is that affiliated fleets' profits are not significantly affected by oil price fluctuations.
Liang Sanbo once visited four Ningbo fleets in a single day. One fleet had three affiliated vehicles, and two drivers chose to take leave and go home. One independent driver, after five days of an empty truck, resolved to return to his hometown. "I communicated with the fleet about raising freight rates. The fleet said freight forwarders won't agree to an increase and there are plenty of people willing to take the job. But with oil prices rising like this, doing a job that loses 200 yuan a day including the vehicle and the person—I really can't do it."
On September 14, the Shenzhen Container Transport Association issued a notice on reasonably collecting fuel surcharges. The notice stated that with the current escalation of US-Iran tensions, international crude oil prices have continued to rise sharply, and some routes are operating at serious losses. If the Middle East conflict continues, oil prices may rise further. The association recommended temporarily collecting a fuel surcharge of 80 to 100 yuan per 100 kilometers on unfinished and newly signed orders. If the listed price of No. 0 diesel subsequently falls below 7.0 yuan per liter and remains at that level for 15 consecutive days, enterprises may cancel this surcharge based on actual circumstances.
In fact, Liang Sanbo told reporters that according to industry association price behavior guidelines, publishing industry benchmark prices and recommended guidance prices is explicitly prohibited. However, given the severe cost inversion situation that has emerged in various regions, some associations have no choice but to defy convention to protect industry income.
On September 19, the Ningbo Transportation Association and the Ningbo Logistics Association also jointly issued a notice to resist vicious low-price competition and disorderly price wars, advising enterprises to communicate amicably and negotiate fully with clients based on oil price fluctuations and their own operating conditions, and to reasonably pass on costs.
Reporters learned that when fleets apply for rate adjustments, they are easily rejected. Freight forwarders and cargo owners demand evidence and documentation. Currently, the price increase effects after some regions issued notices are still not obvious, but Ningbo has the strongest certainty.
According to a CCTV report on September 21, US diesel prices broke through $6.5 per gallon, setting a new high. According to a notice from the Zhejiang Provincial Development and Reform Commission, on September 11 the province's maximum retail price for No. 0 diesel was raised to 7.95 yuan per liter, up 25.79% from the beginning of the year. Some freight forwarders wondered: since the average price of No. 0 diesel from 2024 to now has been about 7.7 yuan per liter, where does the increase come from? Liang Sanbo told reporters that Ningbo container trucks mostly use skid-mounted refueling to reduce costs. Skid-mounted oil has lower density and is cheaper. In the past, the price gap between wholesale skid-mounted oil and listed gas station prices was about 1 yuan per liter. But from February to now, skid-mounted oil prices have surged by 55%, and prices are now basically on par with retail prices.
Where Is the Way Out?
In the comments section of Liang Sanbo's public account, discussions about electric container trucks are no less heated than those about rising oil prices. "Don't underestimate the impact of electric container trucks on fuel trucks," said fleet owner Qu Kun. "As local subsidies increase, large numbers of electric trucks are flooding into Xiamen Port, using cost advantages to push down freight rates, further squeezing the survival space of fuel trucks."
To cope with rising oil prices, a relevant person in charge of a supply chain enterprise told reporters that Xiamen Port is mainly increasing the use of lithium battery new energy transport vehicles and using intelligent scheduling systems to reduce empty mileage. Excluding maintenance and insurance costs, the comprehensive cost per kilometer for an electric container truck is about 1.5 yuan, and the overall operating cost per trip is 70% lower than that of diesel vehicles.
Times are changing, and cost reduction and efficiency improvement have become the main theme of port development. The collection and distribution system of domestic docks is shifting from single-mode transport to multimodal transport. Container truck drivers have almost no bargaining power in this transition. The only choice they can make is whether to switch to electric trucks. However, "unclear subsidies, range anxiety, inefficient charging, and high vehicle purchase costs" still constrain many independent drivers' willingness to proactively embrace change. Qu Kun told reporters that he needs to at least make some money before considering switching vehicles.
The industry's top priority is to change the cutthroat competitive state. On September 23, Liang Sanbo updated reporters on the latest progress: currently, the proportion of Ningbo container truck fleets that have achieved freight rate adjustments has reached 80% to 90%, with price increases of about 10%. He said Ningbo freight forwarders have received an industry "ultimatum" requiring them to complete freight rate adjustments before October 1. For leading freight forwarders that have not yet accepted the price adjustment plan, the industry association will intervene to coordinate. If negotiations fail, it may request relevant regulatory authorities to conduct communication and talks.
"Currently, purely self-owned fleets can only suspend transport for loss-making orders. Some large freight forwarders in Ningbo have also recognized the trend of price adjustments, but progress is relatively slow," Liang Sanbo said. The price adjustment is only to avoid operating at a loss, thereby ensuring supply chain stability.
On the evening of September 24, reporters called the Ningbo Transportation Bureau without revealing their identity to inquire whether the situation regarding container truck freight rate adjustments was accurate. The relevant staff member said they would further investigate the situation and might call back after the holiday if there was any news.
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