Research On Dry Bulk Fleet Planning Of A Ship Company Under Uncertain Condition

Shipping industry is the most important pillar industry in contemporary social economy.Trade,electronics,manufacturing,processing,logistics and other industries are closely linked with shipping industry,which recently receives extensive attention of the academia.And dry bulk maritime transport is one of the most important link in international shipping market,and the sea cargo flow volume of dry bulk reach more than 50%of the world's total shipping volume.The international dry bulk market has characteristics approximate with perfect competition market.The modern ship is with high building cost,long payback period,and the ship investment and update are great economic decisions for shipping companies.Therefore,how to timely and accurately adjust the fleet scale and structure and to keep the enterprise's survival,profitability and development become the focus of shipping industry,which has important theoretical significance and practical significance.This paper firstly analyzes the dry bulk shipping market.Based on cargo type in dry bulk shipping market,named iron ore,coal,and grain,the demand is divided into three segments,then each shipping market is analyzed from aspects of production of goods,and import and export data.According to the ship type,the supply of dry bulk shipping market is divided into three capacity market,namely the Capesize type,the Panamanian type and the Handy type,of which the capacity scale and structure are analyzed.Based on the present situation of A company,this study analyzed A company's fleet structure,including fleet type,age,operation model and so on.The grey prediction model is introduced into the traffic volume forecast of A company,from which the future freight volume on mainly voyage of A company is concluded,providing data sources of demand for fleet planning.Considering the uncertain influence of demand,the study put forward the robust optimization model for fleet planning,and the decision variables were the ship quantity of buying and selling,the quantity of ship rent into,as well as ship assign and idle decision.This model simulated and optimized the investment,purchase,update and usage of the fleet in the future planning period,which made the fleet planning decisions more scientific and practical.Finally,based on the example analysis of A corporate fleet,with the robust optimization mathematical model on fleet planning,the large fleet planning problem was solved,and the results and sensitivity analysis for demand were analyzed.The results showed that this method can solve the fleet planning problem with uncertain demand,and can provide support for the fleet planning decision of large shipping enterprises.