Ocean Shipping Reform Act Passed by U.S. Senate Voice Vote
In just two years, US exporters have seen a four-fold increase in the price of shipping containers, hiking up the prices on the goods.
The cause?
The mostly foreign-owned ocean-carriers have been placing exorbitant fees and penalties onto US exports.
So in early February, the Oceans Shipping Reform Act was introduced to level the playing field for American exporters. The bill will prevent ocean carriers from unreasonably declining shipping opportunities for U.S. exports. It will strengthen the authority of the Federal Maritime Commission who will now be allowed to open investigations and apply enforcement measurements.
Ocean carriers will be required to certify that detention and demurrage charges are in compliance with the federal regulations. The FMC will be allowed to level the penalties.
The bill moved really quickly and was just passed by the U.S. senate with a simple voice note.
Given the fact that Biden had encouraged congress to pass reform legislation governing ocean shipping, it is anticipated that the president will sign the bill when it reaches his desk.
Source: The Maritime Executive
No Alternatives
The West Coast labor unions are set to negotiate new contracts for the dockworkers.
If this goes down like it did last time they renewed the contracts, it will be absolutely disastrous. In 2014, talks dragged on for so long, The White House got involved.
And it took 8-9 months for the terminal to return back to normal operations. Freight forwarding companies opted to reroute their goods to Canada or east coast ports.
Understandably, doing so this time around is out of the question as every terminal is dealing with backlogs and delays as it is.
The expiring contracts of 22,000 will hopefully be settled before the July 1st deadlines. Jim McKenna, the chief executive of the Pacific Maritime Association representing carriers and terminal companies, welcomes the Whitehouse and all stakeholders to get involved and put pressure on the unions to help get the deal to close quickly.
“We need to get this done without any further disruption in the supply chain,” says Mckenna and we can all agree with that!
Source: AJOT
Shanghai airport closes
China’s COVID restrictions have brought one of the most important and busiest airports in the world’s largest air freight market to a standstill. Most flights were canceled and trucks cannot go in and out of the terminal.
It is believed that the cargo already cleared for customs in the already backlogged airport will be allowed to be flown out.
Although trucks are being redirected to other nearby airport terminals, cross-provincial restrictions are making it difficult to do so.
The China-Euro rail passes through Russia and so it’s not an option many are willing to take given the current war. Some are choosing to send the cargo via Turkey but it is the longer route.
Lockdowns are set to ease on April 5. If all goes well, the freight forwarding delays won’t be as harsh as the metrics are predicting.
Source: JOC