We learned a lot about ourselves and our industry in 2010. We learned how quickly demand can drop in a given year, and just as importantly, we learned that world trade is resilient. We also learned the critical value of managing and reducing cost.
None of the pundits came close to predicting the rapidity of the drop in 2009, and they did even worse in projecting the recovery of 2010. This failure of forecasting clearly highlights the interdependency of carriers and our customer base. We have to depend on our customers to forecast demand, and our customers have to depend on us to have the capacity to meet that demand.
There will certainly be challenges in 2011, although hopefully the U.S. economy will not be as large a concern as it seems the risk of the dreaded double-dip now is behind us and steady, more rational growth seems to be in the future.
2011 is shaping up to be the year the industry will shift the management of chassis from the carriers to the end-users. The U.S. is the only country globally where carriers provide chassis as part of their service offering, and having chassis managed by the end-users will bring a more efficient usage of these assets to the industry.
It also appears 2011 is going to be an interesting year on the regulatory front. We see new manifesting rules for the European Union and China, which are going to require manifests to be filed prior to cargo loading onboard the vessels with penalties for noncompliance. We also see the Federal Maritime Commission becoming much more active in the relationship between carriers and customers.