Global trade is entering a new era of more expensive risk
International trade is once again entering a phase in which geopolitical risk is no longer a marginal cost of doing business, but an increasingly visible item in the final price of goods. After a period in which global supply chains gradually stabilized following pandemic-related disruptions, a new wave of security tensions, rerouting of shipping routes, higher insurance premiums, and spikes in transport rates is bringing an old question back to the center of the economic debate: how much does uncertainty actually cost. From manufacturers and shipowners to importers, traders, and end customers, more and more market participants are counting on the fact that goods no longer travel only through a logistics network, but also through a zone of political, military, and regulatory risk.
This is particularly visible at sea, which still carries the bulk of global merchandise trade. According to UNCTAD, maritime transport carries more than 80 percent of world merchandise trade by volume, so any more serious disruption on key routes very quickly moves from being a sector-specific topic to a macroeconomic problem. When ships avoid the Suez Canal and the Red Sea for security reasons and sail around the Cape of Good Hope, that does not just mean a longer journey. It means higher fuel consumption, higher crew costs, greater need for additional shipping capacity, different port schedules, longer delivery cycles, and greater pressure on insurers. In such an environment, even a short-lived incident can turn into a chain reaction that affects freight prices, delivery times, and business plans in industries that depend on precise logistics.
Routes remain open, but at a higher price
The clearest signal comes from the container shipping sector. Drewry’s World Container Index published on March 12 showed a weekly increase of eight percent, to 2,123 dollars for a 40-foot container, with prices on the Shanghai–Rotterdam route rising 19 percent and on the route to Genoa 10 percent. Such moves do not mean a return to the extreme levels seen in the most chaotic phases of the pandemic, but they do confirm that the market is once again sensitive to security shocks and route changes. When shipping companies have to build additional risk into prices, this very quickly spills over to importers, distributors, and manufacturers operating with thin margins and long supply chains.
In its analyses for 2026, UNCTAD warns that world trade is entering a more complex and fragmented environment, in which geopolitical tensions, new tariffs, regulatory uncertainty, and the reshaping of supply chains together create a different economic logic from the one the business sector had grown accustomed to in the era of cheap and predictable globalization-driven growth. In other words, goods are still moving, but this is no longer a system optimized only for speed and cost efficiency. Increasingly important are the security of passage, the ability to reroute quickly, alternative supply routes, and the ability of companies to absorb temporary shocks without interrupting production or triggering sharp price increases.
A particularly important figure from UNCTAD’s 2025 review of maritime transport is that tonnage through the Suez Canal in early May 2025 was still around 70 percent below the average from 2023. This figure is not just a statistical indicator of weaker traffic on one route. It illustrates how deeply the map of global shipping has changed. Ships that do not pass through the shortest route between Asia and Europe lengthen transport times, accumulate additional costs, and alter the availability of capacity across multiple markets at the same time. When such patterns persist for a longer period, this is no longer a temporary anomaly, but a new business standard.
Insurance is no longer a technical detail, but a key cost item
The second major channel of higher costs comes from insurance. During periods of heightened tensions, insurers do not necessarily withdraw coverage completely, but they price it significantly higher. This is particularly visible in war-risk insurance for sailing through sensitive maritime corridors. According to data reported by the Guardian, citing broker Marsh and statements from the London insurance market, premiums for physical war damage to a ship rose from about 0.25 percent of the ship’s value to a range of one to 1.5 percent. For ships whose value is measured in tens of millions of dollars, such a jump very quickly means hundreds of thousands of dollars in additional cost per voyage.
For the public, it is important to understand that such an increase in cost does not stop at shipping companies’ balance sheets. Insurance is built into the transport price, the transport price into the procurement price of goods, and the procurement price into wholesale and retail margins. In sectors with large physical volumes, low margins, and high sensitivity to delivery deadlines, such as the automotive industry, the chemical industry, consumer goods retail, food distribution, or part of industrial manufacturing, these additional costs can hardly be fully neutralized through internal savings. That is precisely why geopolitical risk today is no longer just a story about tankers, straits, and military security, but also about a bill ultimately paid by the broader economy.
In recent weeks, Lloyd’s List has noted that elevated insurance rates remain an important factor in shipowners’ decisions on whether it is worthwhile to enter certain crisis areas. This means that the market reacts not only to an actual attack or actual damage, but also to the mere possibility of an incident. In such a risk regime, business decisions become more cautious, and caution almost always has a price. The more uncertain the route, the more decisions there are about rerouting, delaying, additional insurance, or changing cargo. All of this ultimately reduces the efficiency of global trade.
Energy remains the most sensitive link
The third element of the new cycle of more expensive risk is energy. Although the World Bank in its latest Commodity Markets Outlook still estimates that global commodity prices in 2026 could on average be lower than in previous years, with an expected decline of seven percent in 2025 and a further seven percent in 2026, that projection comes with an important caveat: markets remain sensitive to political and security shocks. In other words, the underlying direction may be toward lower average prices, but short-term shocks can still be strong, especially in oil, gas, and transport-related derivatives.
This is crucial for understanding today’s economic picture. Companies do not plan their operations according to the long-term average, but according to the risk of sudden deviation. If there is a possibility that fuel prices could rise significantly in a short period, a carrier, logistics company, or industrial manufacturer must build that into calculations, contracts, and protective mechanisms. The consequence is a higher cost of capital, a greater need for inventories, more frequent contract revisions, and a more cautious attitude toward investments. This is one of the reasons why today’s economic picture is being built less and less around rapid growth, and more and more around resilience to shocks.
In its review of trends for 2026, UNCTAD warned that world trade growth would remain positive, but slower, after the record year 2025 in which the value of global trade according to preliminary data exceeded 35 trillion dollars for the first time. A positive level of trade, however, does not mean a return to old predictability. If international exchange is greater, but takes place through more expensive corridors, with higher protective costs and lower delivery security, then the quality of growth changes. Trade is growing, but it is “heavier” to finance, plan, and insure.
Resilience is replacing the logic of maximum efficiency
This is precisely the most important structural change visible in the business world today. For years, companies built supply chains according to a model of maximum efficiency: the cheapest supplier, the shortest route, the smallest inventory, the fastest delivery. That model works well in a period of stable routes, low interest rates, and predictable political relations. In conditions of increasingly frequent geopolitical shocks, that same model becomes vulnerable. Today, for many companies, it is more important to have a backup supplier, a regional warehouse, several contracted transport routes, and the ability to adapt quickly, than to achieve the absolute lowest cost per unit of goods.
Such a change is already altering investment and production decisions. There is increasing talk of “friend-shoring,” regionalization, the shortening of supply chains, and the rearrangement of supply networks toward politically more reliable partners. But that is not a cost-free process either. Relocating part of production, opening new warehouses, or contracting additional logistics options increases fixed costs. In other words, resilience is not a substitute for cost, but a new kind of cost. The only difference is that companies increasingly see this cost as necessary insurance against future disruptions.
Viewed more broadly, this is also the reason why some economists are increasingly moving away from the optimistic assumption that globalization by itself will constantly lower prices and spread gains without major interruptions. Today’s system looks more like a network in which economic efficiency must constantly be aligned with security, energy exposure, regulation, and geopolitical assessment. It is a slower, more expensive, and administratively more demanding form of international trade.
Macroeconomic picture: growth exists, but with visible slowing
International institutions are offering a similar basic message: the world economy is not entering collapse, but it is entering a period of weaker and more sensitive growth. The International Monetary Fund in its January update of forecasts estimates global growth of 3.3 percent in 2026, while the United Nations in the publication World Economic Situation and Prospects 2026 gives a lower estimate of 2.7 percent and warns of the risk that the world economy could slide into a permanently slower growth pattern than before the pandemic. The differences in estimates stem from methodology and the timing of the projections, but the direction is similar: momentum exists, but it is not strong enough to absorb new trade and security shocks without problems.
The United Nations estimates that the growth of international trade, after 3.8 percent in 2025, could slow to 2.2 percent in 2026. This figure is important because it shows that trade formally remains in positive territory, but with a weaker pace and a greater number of obstacles. In practice, this means that each new crisis on key routes will have a greater relative effect than under conditions of stronger global growth. When economic momentum is weaker, the space for absorbing additional logistics and energy costs becomes smaller, and the pressure on prices and margins becomes more visible.
Who is most exposed to the new wave of costs
The most exposed are industries in which logistics is not a secondary cost, but the foundation of the business model. These are, above all, sectors that deal with large quantities of goods and a high share of transport in the total price: fast-moving consumer goods trade, the automotive and mechanical engineering industries, chemical products, construction inputs, part of the food chain, and energy-intensive industries. When routes lengthen and insurance, fuel, and port fees rise, pressure on profitability appears very quickly.
But exposed are also countries that depend on imports of basic inputs or exports through long maritime corridors. UNCTAD has long warned that developing economies are particularly vulnerable when maritime costs rise and remain unstable, because they have less fiscal space, weaker logistics diversification, and greater sensitivity to import prices of food, energy, and industrial goods. For them, more expensive risk in global trade is not just a matter of large companies’ balance sheets, but also a question of inflation, public finances, and social stability.
New rules of the game for companies and consumers
For companies, this means that 2026, at least according to the available indicators, will be a year of planning under heightened uncertainty. Not all branches of the economy will feel the same impact, nor will every disruption last equally long. But the trend is clear enough: international trade no longer rests on the assumption that geopolitical risk will remain separate from the everyday costs of doing business. It is now being built into transport, insurance, energy, inventory financing, and procurement strategy.
For consumers, this does not necessarily mean an immediate and linear increase in the prices of all products, but it does mean that the era of cheap and almost invisible logistics is behind us. In some sectors, companies will absorb part of the shock themselves in order to preserve market share. In others, they will gradually pass it on to customers. What is perhaps most important is that global trade is not slowing only because of a lack of demand, but also because security is becoming a commodity in itself. And when security becomes more expensive, the goods that travel through it become more expensive as well.
Sources:- UN Trade and Development (UNCTAD) – overview of the key trends shaping global trade in 2026, including slower growth and the greater impact of geopolitics (link)- UNCTAD – Review of Maritime Transport 2025 and the accompanying overview of pressure on maritime trade, the Suez Canal, and rising transport costs (link)- Drewry – World Container Index of March 12, 2026, with data on the rise in container rates on key routes (link)- World Bank – Commodity Markets Outlook with estimates of commodity price and energy market trends in 2025 and 2026 (link)- International Monetary Fund – World Economic Outlook Update, January 2026, with an estimate of global growth and trade pressures (link)- United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs – World Economic Situation and Prospects 2026, with estimates of growth and the slowing of world trade (link)- The Guardian – report on the rise in insurance premiums for shipping through the Strait of Hormuz and the broader impact of security risk on maritime trade (link)- Lloyd’s List – current analyses on the impact of elevated insurance rates and security tensions on shipping decisions and global trade (link)
Find accommodation nearby
Creation time: 2 hours ago