Danish shipping group Maersk Line has announced that it is adding a new vessel to the rotation of its east coast of South America-Middle East (SAMBA) service.

The change has been made in order to improve schedule reliability and optimise speed of transport, providing a more 'environmentally friendly' service with reduced emissions. 'By adding a vessel, we will increase the transit time by an average of four days,' Maersk Line added.

The first vessel on the new schedule will be Maersk Jakarta, which is expected to arrive at the Suez Canal on 5 November 2008.

The rotation of the service will remain the same, calling at Itajai (Brazil), Paranagua (Brazil), Rio Grande (Brazil), Santos (Brazil), Salalah (Oman), Jebel Ali (United Arab Emirates), Algeciras (Spain), Dakar (Senegal) and Vitoria (Brazil).