• Group 1:

This group includes large industrial owners and shippers in the oil, iron and metal, chemical, paper and forest products, automotive, food industries, etc. industries. Their cargo is equal to the full capacity of the ship and there is a need for regular and continuous transportation. Therefore, this group either owns the ship itself and uses its own fleet for transportation or takes over the management of the ship through long-term charter. This shipping method is called industrial shipping.

It is estimated that about half of the tanker fleet is either owned by oil companies or has been long-term chartered by them. And in the dry bulk market, about 30% of the available ship capacity belongs to large industrial companies. Assuming that these private fleets have the same productivity as the rest of the fleet, we conclude that about 1600 to 2000 million tons of cargo are transported by the industries themselves, which means that this amount of cargo is outside the free shipping market.

• Group 2:

The owners and shippers of bulk cargoes who have a large cargo but whose need for transportation is irregular or even regular and continuous but does not justify the ownership of a private fleet. The owners of goods in this market are basically small and medium-sized commercial and industrial groups and owners of seasonal goods such as grains, fertilizers, coal, timber or other dry or liquid bulk goods such as oil, ore, etc. These types of goods are transported through tramp shipping.

The size of this market is large. The entire liquid or dry bulk market, other than that carried by industrial shipping, is in the tramp shipping market. In addition, a part of the miscellaneous (general) goods is also moved by tramp shipping. In fact, it is impossible to say exactly how many tons of cargo belong to this market (tramp shipping). However, we can estimate that this amount of cargo constitutes approximately 45% of the total goods transported in the world.

• Group 3:

This group is made up of owners of goods and packages whose cargo is much smaller than the ship’s hold space; whether they require regular or irregular transportation. These types of goods are called general cargo or general cargo in maritime transport. Shippers of these goods must use liner shipping services – regular lines. Miscellaneous goods transported by liner services constitute 10-15% of the total world maritime trade and approximately 800-1000 million tons of cargo in each of the recent years. Most of the ships used in liner shipping are general cargo ships (carrying miscellaneous goods), ro-ro ships (Roll On-Roll Off) and container ships

In the maritime transport industry, the shipping market is a competitive market. Because a large number of shipowners and shippers can freely enter or exit this market. Tramp shipping – irregular lines – and liner – regular lines – are such markets, although the level or degree of freedom in its true sense is different between these two markets. But unlike these two shipping markets, industrial shipping does not constitute such a game market. Because in this type of shipping, the shippers or cargo owners are the same as the ship owners. Our discussion here will focus on liner and tramp shipping.

The above analysis is based on the demand for maritime transport. That is, the characteristics of maritime transport demand require occasional (temporary) tramp shipping services for large and bulky cargoes, and regular and continuous liner shipping services for packages and small cargoes. Now we will take a closer look at tramp and liner shipping from the supply side of maritime transport.