Huge canal schemes may be missing trade boat: analysts

[LONDON] Vast projects to expand the Suez and Panama canals are being talked up as the biggest upheaval for decades in global maritime traffic, but experts say they could be outflanked by a trade shift towards Asia.

In recent years, freight traffic travelling from Asia to the east coast of the United States has increasingly circumvented the Panama Canal and its restrictions on ship size in favour of the Suez route open to most big vessels.

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has launched plans for a second Suez canal in parallel to the existing one at a cost of US$4 billion.