Nippon Yusen
Japan-based Nippon Yusen Kaisha (日本郵船株式会社, Nippon Yūsen Kabushiki-gaisha) (TYO: 9101) or NYK Line, is one of the largest shipping companies in the world. It is a core Mitsubishi company.
History
1870-1900
The company traces its history back to the Tsukumo Shokai Shipping company founded by the Tosa clan in 1870. In 1875, as Mitsubishi Shokai, it inaugurated Japan's first passenger liner service, with a route from Yokohama to Shanghai. The company merged with Kyodo Unyu Kaisha (founded 1882) in 1885, and adopted its present name.
The merged company had a fleet of 58 steamships and expanded its operations rapidly, first to other ports of the East and then worldwide, with liner service to London inaugurated in 1899.
1900-1937
NYK became a state monopoly. The majority of Japanese merchant ships, tankers and liners sailed with it, before and during the Pacific war. Regular services linked Kobe and Yokohama with South America, Batavia, Melbourne, Cape Town; and frequent cruises to San Francisco and Seattle. Other routes connected local Chinese cabotage vessels on the Chinese coasts and upper Yangtze.
Ocean routes went east from Japan to Vancouver (Canada) or Seattle(USA). Another way was to stop in Hawaii, and continue to San Francisco and the Panama Canal. The next commercial routes were south from Japan, across the East China Sea. These went to South East Asia, the China coasts, and towards India and the Indian Ocean, to Europe or Batavia (Dutch Indies), or Australia and New Zealand. The fastest sevices took ten days from Yokohama to Seattle, and one month to Europe.
Local sea routes connected 78 home seaports (38 open to foreign trade). Yokohama, Kobe and Osaka had the greatest importance for trading with Japan. These ports had the third, fourth and eighth place in net tonnage registered in the world. Coal passed from Moji to Osaka and Yokohama. Karafuto timber represented a third part of local trade. Soy bean products from Dairen and Ryojun arrived at Yokohama. The sugar cane of the South Pacific Mandate and Formosa, cotton, salt and minerals represented other important parts of these transport transactions. The current funnel livery was introduced in 1929.
The company also ran services connecting metropolitan Japan to its exterior provinces (Chosen, Karafuto, Kwantung, Formosa and South Mandate) of the Empire. During the war the NYK Line operated a military transport service for Japanese Army and Navy troops. Many vessels were sunk by the Allied navies, and installations and ports were attacked from the air. Its surviving vessels and equipment were confiscated by the Allied authorities, as reparations, or taken by recently liberated Asian states, during 1945-46.
1945-present
World War II resulted in the destruction of much of the fleet, but by the mid-1950s NYK ships were again seen around the world.
As the demand for passenger ships dwindled in the 1960s, NYK expanded its cargo operation, running Japan's first container ship Hakone Maru on a route to California in 1968 and soon establishing container ship routes to many other ports. NYK became a partner in Nippon Cargo Airlines in 1978, and in 1985, added United States container train service in cooperation with Southern Pacific.
NYK revived its passenger ship business in 1989 with cruise ships operated by its newly-formed subsidiary Crystal Cruises. It is the tenth largest container transportation and shipping company in the world.
See also
External links
Further reading
- Richard Cook and Marcus Oleniuk (April 2007). Around the World in 40 Feet, Two Hundred Days in the Life of a 40ft NYK Shipping Container. WordAsia Publishing. ISBN 978-988-97392-3-2