As your trusted freight forwarder, we are here to notify you of any situtations that may affect your supply chain and the supply of goods to your customers.

As such, we are can confirm that China’s State Council announced on January 27 that the Lunar New Year / Spring Festival holiday will be extended to February 2 across the country; the holiday week was originally from January 24 to January 30.

We have since had confirmation today that local governments are imposing their own extenstions to the State Council extension through to the 9th February, and thus enforcing the compulsory closure of all non-essential services and businesses in an effort to contain the Coronavirus

So far the following provinces and municipalties have announced the additional extension: Shanghai, Zhejiang Province, Guangdong Province, Chongqing,  Juangsu, and Yunnan. It is likely more will follow suit.

In addition to this, several airlines, including British Airways have cancelled all flights to mainland China.

The current information that we have is that customs, sea ports and airports will all be operating as normal, however these measures put in place are likely to affect your supply chain and the flow of goods to and from China in the short term.

However, in addition to the manufacture of goods being halted, it is likely that there will be port congestion, both landside and seaside/airside, and space is bound to be restricted and at a premium due to the backlogs being created by the extension to the Chinese New Year Holiday and the reduction of capacity in the air freight market caused by the airlines withdrawing their services.

We will update you accordingly with any further information we recieve.