摘要：Shipping has had a strong influence on economic process of specialization in the global economy. Nevertheless, there is also an interactive influence due to the fact that specialization has influenced shipping in return. The process of specialization plays an increasingly important role in shipping particularly in the last twenty years. In that period significant changes have happened in shipping. Shipping markets have been separated from each other and consolidated in line with various shipping sectors as well as according to vessels’ types and sizes. Ships are now specialized for a particular type of cargo while the universality in shipping lost its economic justifiability and disappeared. Specialization in shipping is being expressed through the economy of scale and service differentiation. The bigger the lot of cargo, the smaller the transportation costs for the same. Due to this fact, poor internal value cargoes can be transported as well. Differentiation of shipping service means a particular specialized service which differs in quality from other similar but standardized services. Specialization means improvement in production of a particular product or particular service aiming to ensure rationalization of production costs input. The economic background of specialization in shipping is to be found in cheap costs of production of shipping transportation service as well as better quality. The final aim is increased market competitiveness and bigger profit. By decreasing the shipping costs, the process of specialization at the same time increases the efficiency of shipping resulting in the end with cheaper goods.
关键词：shipping; specialization; economy of scale; service differentiation; competition; costs; input; market
