Technology, trust and the limits of automation dominated debate at the opening session of day two at last week’s Geneva Dry 2026, where owners, charterers, traders and technology providers gathered to discuss how digital tools are reshaping dry bulk shipping’s supply chain.

The Digital Efficiency Drivers Across The Dry Bulk Supply Chain panel focused on how predictive analytics, automated workflows, port call optimisation and emissions reporting can help cut waste and improve margins from mine to mill. But while speakers agreed the industry is collecting more data than ever before, many argued shipping still struggles to turn information into better real-time decisions.

Moderating the session, Marcura vice president of product and strategic growth Janani Yagnamurthy opened with a reminder of the scale of information already flowing through the sector.

“We track port conditions, vessel positions, weather performance, almost everything in real time,” she said. “But do we actually connect dots?”

Yagnamurthy noted that the industry records around 1.3m port calls a year, yet dry bulk continues to suffer from operational inefficiencies, planning gaps and margin leakage.

A recurring theme throughout the panel was the growing divide between planning and operational reality.

Audra Drablos, strategy director at Inmarsat Maritime, argued that reliable connectivity remains the foundation for any meaningful digital gains.

She described a common bulk shipping scenario where a berth schedule changes shortly before arrival, but the update either arrives late or not at all.

“The vessel just steams full ahead, and fuel is burned unnecessarily,” Drablos said. “If connectivity isn’t consistent, especially in those critical moments, you’ll find it hard to have operational efficiency.”

Speakers agreed that shipping has largely moved beyond the problem of simply accessing data. The bigger challenge now is ensuring information reaches decision makers at the right moment and in a format that can be acted upon quickly.

Russ Hubbard, chief commercial officer at Veson Nautical, said the industry still faces both internal and external connectivity problems.

“You can actually have all of the data exist, but it’s not there at the moment of decision support,” Hubbard said. “All of those have to come together for the actual correct decision to be made with expediency.”

The panel repeatedly returned to the issue of interoperability, a term speakers joked had become one of the most overused phrases at Geneva Dry this year. Behind the buzzword, however, sat a serious concern: the lack of standardisation between platforms, owners, charterers, ports and supply chain participants.

Morten Lovstad, business director for bulk carriers at DNV, argued that trust in data quality will determine whether AI and automation can genuinely improve shipping operations.

“What makes the world go around is data,” Lovstad said. “But you also need to verify them and ensure that these data are quality assured.”

Lovstad pointed to emissions reporting frameworks such as MRV and DCS as examples of existing standards that could become powerful optimisation tools if properly integrated across fleets and systems.

“If you standardise that and verify them, that’s a fantastic source to do fleet optimisation,” he said.

Several panellists stressed that AI’s value will depend less on flashy interfaces and more on the quality of the underlying proprietary data feeding those systems.

Daniel Schildt, chief strategy officer at Pangaea Logistics Solutions, said owners are now flooded with technology offerings and face growing pressure to separate genuinely useful products from marketing hype.

“We want to make sure to implement and adopt technology that serves a purpose,” Schildt said. “Not the latest and greatest new shiny thing.”

He warned that many companies are experiencing technology fatigue as vendors aggressively market AI-driven solutions to chartering and operations teams already dealing with complex workflows.

Schildt said the key test for any new platform is whether it improves utilisation, reduces costs and helps staff make faster, more informed decisions without adding further operational burden.

The discussion also highlighted the growing tension between automation and human judgement.

Despite the rise of predictive tools and AI-assisted voyage planning, several speakers argued that dry bulk’s inherent unpredictability still requires experienced operators to interpret information rather than blindly follow automated outputs.

Willem Vermaat, shipping director at Heidelberg Materials Trading, questioned whether the industry has really changed as much as it claims.

“We collected a lot, but we didn’t transfer a lot. We didn’t change a lot,” Vermaat said.

Using vessel ETA management as an example, Vermaat noted that despite years of digitalisation, charterers still often rely on brokers phoning owners directly for arrival updates rather than trusting automated systems.

Schildt added that fully automated voyage communication could sometimes create more confusion than clarity.

“A computer is going to take exactly what’s put in that day and send it out,” he said. “It could create more problems.”

The panel agreed that dry bulk presents a particularly difficult challenge for AI compared to more standardised shipping segments such as containers or tankers.

“There is so much that goes into our business and so much everything impacts dry cargo,” Schildt said. “Dry is a completely different category.”

Even so, speakers acknowledged that AI is already starting to solve practical operational problems.

Hubbard pointed to port coding and standardisation as one area where AI can now bridge gaps that previously required extensive manual mapping between systems.

“There are examples where we’re able to see AI stepping into the gap,” he said.

Still, trust remained the dominant issue hanging over the conversation.

When Hubbard asked the audience how many trusted their data, only a few hands went up. Asked whether they trusted their people, nearly the entire room responded positively.

That contrast summed up the mood of the session: the technology may be advancing quickly, but confidence in the systems is still lagging behind.

Closing the discussion, Yagnamurthy warned that even small inefficiencies can rapidly compound in a thin-margin sector like dry bulk shipping.

She estimated that for an owner or operator handling around 2,000 port calls a year, inefficiencies of just 1% to 2% could amount to roughly $7m annually.

As the panel wrapped up, speakers broadly agreed that the next phase of digitalisation in dry bulk will not be defined by standalone software products alone, but by collaboration, cleaner data and greater willingness across the supply chain to share information.

“Transparency, data and interoperability,” Yagnamurthy concluded. “Everything else will follow.”