No Time to Relax as 416 Incidents in July See Losses Exceed €4.4m
Any hopes that cargo criminals might take a summer break were dispelled in July with the TAPA EMEA Intelligence System (TIS) recording 416 new incidents impacting supply chains in 27 countries across the Europe, Middle East & Africa region.
Only 12% of these reported crimes shared a loss value but these still produced a significant total of €4,403,007, an average of more than €88,000 or a daily loss of €142,032 for every day of July. This included 11 cargo thefts or attempted crimes involving losses of €100,000 or more, which averaged €327,304 per incident.
In Vigilant, TAPA EMEA is authorised to share intelligence on three of these highest value losses, all involving thefts of metal:
€450,000
On 18 July, offenders stole a shipment of metal from a Destination Facility in Hesse, Germany.
€312,117
In Gqeberha in South Africa’s Eastern Cape, four employees working in an Origin Facility were arrested in connection with the theft of platinum plates.
€100,000
In another major loss in Germany, thieves stole several large cable drums after gaining access to an Origin Facility on an industrial park in Fohren, Rhineland-Palatinate.
Other major crimes with individual losses of €100K or more were recorded in Germany, Lebanon, the Netherlands, Nigeria, Romania, South Africa, and Spain in July. TAPA EMEA members can view information on these crimes by accessing the TIS cargo crime database using their MyTAPA logins.
The seven incidents in the loss value range of €50K-€100K produced an overall loss total of €486,121, and included:
- €83,333 – 26 pallets of baby food stolen from a container onboard a trailer parked on a public road in Doncaster, South Yorkshire, United Kingdom on 27 July.
- €80,000 – a shipment of technology devices stolen from a facility in the German state of Rhineland-Palatinate on 18 July.
- €60,000 – auto parts stolen from a Destination Facility in Kirchlengern, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, on 15 July.
- €56,533 – Another loss of vehicle parts, this time from an Origin Facility in Pretoria, South Africa, on 22 July. Four suspects were arrested.
Germany was the country with the highest number of cargo crimes reported to the TIS database in July, with 122 incidents in 31 days, 29% of the monthly total, followed by South Africa with 107 recorded thefts. Four other countries in the EMEA region suffered double-digit crime levels:
- United Kingdom – 56 incidents or 13.4% of the monthly total
- France – 30 or 7.2%
- Spain – 26 or 6.25%
- Italy – 23 or 5.5%
While metal was clearly a prime target for cargo criminal in this reporting period, with 21 losses or 5% of the monthly total, fuel remained the TIS product category with the highest incident rate. In July, TIS received reports of 81 fuel thefts, disrupting supply chains in 13 countries: Austria, Croatia, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Nigeria, Poland, South Africa, Spain, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom. Germany accounted for 54 or over 66% of these losses. Theft from Vehicle was the most recorded type of incident in July, reported for 117 or 28.1% of all crimes, but the month also saw a higher-than-average number of Theft from Facility crimes, 80 overall across the month. Another worrying trend is the increase in the number of incidents involving violence. TIS saw 107 or 25% of crimes reporting this M.O. in July.
