Analysis of obstacles faced by intra-Asian shipping liners in Korea

As intra-Asian trades grow, businesses in the intra-Asian shipping market have expanded. Subsequently, many shipping liners, which have struggled since 2008, have made inroads into Asia as a new market. Although the intra-Asian trade volume has increased, shipping liners in intra-Asia experience difficulties in their timeliness and excessive competition due to unfavorable weather, as well as changes in global shipping liners’ operational strategies. Hence, this study aims to identify the obstacles faced by Korean intra-Asian shipping liners (KIASL) and suggests solutions using Fuzzy- technique for order preference by similarity to ideal solution (MCDM). As a result of an analysis to weigh these obstacles, an oversupply of ships (0.693) was analyzed as the greatest obstacle to KIASL. As a result of evaluating the obstacles’ impact on each KIASL route, it was determined that the Korea-Singapore (0.870) and Korea-Vietnam (0.583) routes were significantly affected by obstacles. Further, an analysis of measures to overcome these obstacles revealed a high weight for the integration between KIASL (0.168) and support from operating funds (0.152).