A plan for a Russian state-owned shipper could subsidize container shipping on the Northern Sea Route

A state-owned operator using transshipment hubs could make the route less risky — and less of a PR challenge — for outside shippers.

Arctic shipping along Russia’s northern coastline has seen record levels of traffic each of the past six years with cargo growing from 1.6 million tons in 2013 to 20 million tons last year. However, none of this growth has come from container shipping, apart from a small-scale test voyage run by Maersk in September 2018. In fact, three of the world’s top five container shipping companies have vowed to not operate in the Arctic citing environmental concerns.