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Modelling Tramp Shipping Tonne-Miles in an Ever-Changing Market

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Abstract

The tonne-mile metric serves as a measure to proxy demand for commodity transport in tramp shipping, yet predicting it is challenging due to complex trade route interdependencies and a dynamic geopolitical landscape. This study proposes a methodology for predicting tonne-miles based on trade flow modelling. Leveraging country-level export and import data, we frame tonne-mile estimation as a variant of the Minimum-Cost Flow Problem (MCFP) tailored towards tramp shipping and construct a time-expanded flow network that integrates multiple datasets to capture trade relationships. To evaluate the methodology, we perform a series of experiments across four key Clean Petroleum Product (CPP) commodities, demonstrating the ability of the model to reconstruct tonne-miles over a four-year historical period with a 2.1% Mean Absolute Percentage Error (MAPE). Finally, we showcase our method’s utility as a decision-support tool by estimating future tonne-miles under several market scenarios utilising projected country-level export and import data. The framework can be used to estimate tonne-miles per commodity segment both regularly and during disruptions, such as geopolitical tensions.

Suggested Citation

  • Bläser, Nikolaj & Magnussen, Búgvi Benjamin & Fuentes, Gabriel, 2026. "Modelling Tramp Shipping Tonne-Miles in an Ever-Changing Market," Discussion Papers 2026/13, Norwegian School of Economics, Department of Business and Management Science.
    • Handle: RePEc:hhs:nhhfms:2026_013
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    JEL classification:

    • C44 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods: Special Topics - - - Operations Research; Statistical Decision Theory
    • C63 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Mathematical Methods; Programming Models; Mathematical and Simulation Modeling - - - Computational Techniques
    • R40 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Transportation Economics - - - General

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