Mediterranean Shipping opens direct route from Ningbo, China to Callao, Peru
Recently, global shipping giant MSC officially announced the opening of a direct route from Ningbo Port in China to Callao Port in Peru. This new route, named ALPACA, with its core advantage of "20 day direct", has completely changed the traditional transportation pattern of Sino Peruvian trade and built an efficient cold chain channel for the upcoming Chilean cherry harvest season.
The opening of new air routes has achieved a leapfrog improvement in transportation efficiency. Prior to this, goods from China to Peru had to detour through ports in Central America such as Mexico and Panama for transit, which took up to 40-45 days. This not only extended the trade cycle but also increased the cost of goods loss and capital occupation. The ALPACA direct flight route reduces the travel time to around 20 days, doubling the efficiency and becoming a "fast track" connecting Asia and the west coast of South America. The route will connect multiple key ports along the way, including Ningbo, Busan, Callao in Peru, Arica in Chile, Iquique, Nansha, and Hong Kong, forming a wide transportation network covering the west coast of East Asia and South America. Ten 7000 TEU container ships will be deployed to ensure stable transportation capacity.
Mediterranean Shipping attaches great importance to this strategic route and has currently deployed about 14 ships for specialized operations in the Peru region. These ships adopt a "two-way complementary" operation mode: when departing from Ningbo Port, they mainly load Chinese advantageous products such as electronic products, household appliances, textiles, and automotive parts, and transport them to Callao Port to meet the demand of the Peruvian market; After unloading, the ship will immediately head to the nearby Chilean port to carry fresh agricultural products such as cherries that are about to enter the harvest season back to Asia, while providing professional cold chain logistics services under the positioning of "MSC Cherry Express". Coinciding with Chile's launch of the 2025-2026 cherry export season on November 19th, the timely opening of new shipping routes will significantly improve the freshness of fresh fruits, allowing Asian consumers to taste high-quality cherries from South America faster.
Behind this route layout is the strong foundation of China Peru trade and the continuous increase in market demand. China is Peru's trading partner, not only the main buyer of core minerals such as copper mines in Peru, but also an important source of daily consumer goods for the Peruvian people. The opening of direct air routes will further activate the potential for bilateral trade. Gonzalo Santiliana, General Manager of Mediterranean Shipping Peru, stated that the current ship cargo load rate remains high, and there is strong market interest in direct shipping services. The timing for opening direct Asian routes is fully ripe. In the future, after the cherry harvest season ends, there are plans to expand direct export services from Kaya Russia Port to Asia, with a focus on benefiting Peruvian fruit producers and other export enterprises.
In order to ensure the efficient operation of new shipping routes, the Ningbo Maritime Department relies on a digital supervision platform to implement minute level control over ship entry and exit plans. Through the service models of "direct entry, direct berthing, direct departure, and direct exit" and "one report, smooth operation of the entire line", it achieves "zero delay" for ship arrivals and "zero delay" for operations, effectively releasing the operational efficiency of the port. The relevant executives of Callao Port commented that the opening of this new route is the "unstoppable trend beginning", which will gradually promote Peru to become a logistics hub in South America and attract more direct routes to Asia.
As an important new ocean route added to Ningbo Zhoushan Port, ALPACA direct shipping not only alleviates the tight transportation situation along the west coast of South America and reduces the comprehensive logistics costs of both trading parties, but also further expands the international radiation of China's coastal ports, injecting new momentum into China Latin America trade.