HONG KONG \u2014 The waters of the South China Sea surrounding Hong Kong were the setting for an uncommon sight this week: A growing crowd of hulking cargo ships bobbing aimlessly in the haze as their frustrated crews, captains, agents and owners waited for them to be able to come in to port.<\/p>\n
A rare strike among contract dockworkers at the cargo terminals owned by Li Ka-shing, Asia\u2019s richest man, stretched into its seventh day Wednesday, and the walkout is starting to have a real and increasing effect on the flow of ships and goods on the doorstep of the world\u2019s workshop, in southern China.<\/p>\n
If the strike drags on, it could affect the peak season for cargo volume, which begins in May and lasts until October, as exporters hurry goods from southern Chinese ports to retailers in the United States and Europe to meet holiday season demand.<\/p>\n
Although it is better known these days as a global financial center akin to New York or London, Hong Kong still ranks as the world\u2019s third-busiest container port, after Shanghai and Singapore. Despite its higher charges and slightly greater distance from export factories when compared with the mainland ports of southern China, Hong Kong has maintained this position because it has the most frequent connections to the United States, Europe and the rest of Asia. It also has been \u2014 until the past week \u2014 one of the most efficient ports in the world, analysts say.<\/p>\n
Now, because of the strike, some vessels scheduled to dock at the port are facing delays as long as 60 hours \u2014 20 times as long as the three-hour wait considered normal. Those delays will ripple across the global supply chain, adding to costs as ships are forced to reroute or to skip subsequent ports of call.<\/p>\n
\u201cMost of the cargo comes from China or is destined for China, and the reason people bother to truck goods all the way to or from Hong Kong is because it is more efficient,\u201d said Roberto Giannetta, the secretary of the Hong Kong Liner Shipping Association. Protracted delays, he said, \u201caffect everything down the line.\u201d<\/p>\n
Evergreen Line, a large regional shipping company based in Taiwan, said that as of Wednesday, more than 10 of its vessels had been left waiting for berths in Hong Kong because of the strike. Three or four of those would need to be rerouted to the nearby ports of Shekou in the Chinese province of Guangdong or Khaosiung in southern Taiwan, a company representative said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is not a good situation at all,\u201d said a senior executive at another major regional shipping company, who declined to be identified, citing the sensitivity of commercial contracts with the port operator. \u201cIt is not only Hong Kong. It\u2019s going to hurt everywhere, in a way.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe majority of our vessels are waiting for berths right now because we hadn\u2019t expected that this thing would last this long,\u201d he added, estimating that his company had 20 vessels floating off Hong Kong, each having to wait at least two days to get into port. \u201cThat\u2019s expensive.\u201d<\/p>\n
The strike itself is notable not just for the effect it is having on commerce, but for having happened at all. Unlike their better organized counterparts in the United States \u2014 the longshoremen who won concessions after threatening to close East Coast ports from Massachusetts to Texas in December, or the striking port workers who closed the Los Angeles and Long Beach ports in California for several days in November \u2014 unions have historically been weak in the Hong Kong port.<\/p>\n
Apart from a 2001 blockade of the main road leading to the port by striking truck drivers that lasted only several days, the last wide-scale organized labor actions appear to have been during attempted Communist-backed port strikes in the 1960s, when Hong Kong, a British colony at the time, felt the effects of China\u2019s Cultural Revolution.<\/p>\n
Hong Kong has changed dramatically. A widening wealth gap and soaring housing and other daily living costs have created a sense of disenfranchisement among even middle-class residents, who now take to the streets in protest several times a year, often in the tens of thousands.<\/p>\n
The current strike began March 28, when several hundred subcontracted workers at Hongkong International Terminals, a unit of Mr. Li\u2019s Hutchison Port Holdings Trust, walked off the job to push for a pay raise of around 20 percent from the 55 Hong Kong dollars, or $7, they say they make in average hourly pay.<\/p>\n
They include workers like Mr. Chen, a 16-year veteran of the dockyards whose job is to verify that his team is loading or unloading the correct shipping container from the correct ship. Mr. Chen, who would only give his surname because he was worried about retribution from the contractor that employs him, said that after several pay cuts, he was worse off than when he started on the job.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe hours are long, and the work can be dangerous at times,\u201d he said. \u201cCounting inflation, I am making less than I did 10 years ago.\u201d <\/p>\n