He said the increase is to compensate the increasing production cost of making reefer containers and the growing operation cost of reefer services.
Besides, Mr Skou said the level of reefer rates has been much lower than the growth of inflation and bunker costs in the past seven years, reflected in a two per cent annual increase of reefer rates, but a four per cent growth in inflation and 18 per cent surge in bunker costs.
As the market leader in the reefer segment, Maersk`s reefer fleet can carry 230,000 FEU, accounting for 23 per cent of the global fleet of one million FEU, reports American Shipper.
But the carrier recently withdrew its reefer-intensive services from South America to North America (the Spondylus) and Europe (the Andean). Mr Skou said earlier Maersk will curtail 25,000 TEU of reefer capacity, more than 10 per cent of its existing fleet.
Looking ahead, Mr Skou said Maersk will stop investing in new reefer equipment in 2013 along with the rate increase.
But he said this will not change Maersk`s last year`s decision to buy a reefer equipment production plant in Chile. As that plant will be available to start production in 2014, Mr Skou hopes the rates will have improved enough at that time to allow more production.
As reefers require more investment than dry containers, Maersk`s reefer slowdown is likely to affect the supply-demand balance in the near term, as conventional vessel reefer capacity has been declining and scrapping rates have doubled from 2008 to 2012.
The number of conventional reefer ships stood at 847 in 2008, according to an American Shipper report, but is expected to decrease to 691 by the end of 2012 and to 362 by 2018, resulting in a more than 50 per cent fall in a decade.
Maersk projects that there will be an annual demand growth of five per cent. So in 2015, the reefer box supply will be short by as high as nine per cent.
Mr Skou said the liner industry needs to invest a total of $3.5 billion in new reefer equipment between 2012 and 2015.