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“The short term is bad, but it’s actually the long term that’s more of a concern,” said Mike Steenhoek, executive director of the Soy Transportation Coalition. Brazil and Argentina have emerged as serious challengers to the once-dominant US position as the world’s top supplier of soybeans.

“We have to move together with the village so we can all advance together and create the solutions that the new economy requires,” PSA International Group CEO Tan Chong Meng told roughly 500 attendees in his keynote address at JOC's TPM Asia 2018 Conference in Shenzhen on Wednesday. “Somewhere in our strategies, I hope we will overlap.”

For shippers, the results of the latest vote on a Teamsters union contract at UPS were nothing if not confusing. But don’t panic. There’s little chance the wheels will stop turning at UPS or UPS Freight.

“Retailers are continuing to import merchandise in order to meet consumer demand even though tariffs are now in place on roughly half the goods imported from China and the trade war is still escalating,” Jonathan Gold, vice president for supply chain and customs policy at the National Retail Federation, said Tuesday.

The US Coast Guard has declared Condition Yankee for the eastern US Gulf of Mexico ports including Panama City, Pensacola, Mobile, Pascagoula, and Gulfport. Under that status, ports are closed to inbound and outbound traffic.

During the past several years, the less-than-truckload industry and the analyst community have made a big deal of the need to convert to dimensional pricing instead of the classification system of the regulated era that ended in 1980.

Conceptualized in India, the program complements Maersk’s global technological ecosystem and open innovation efforts.

Many shippers have created their own bunker adjustment factors (BAFs), but smaller beneficial cargo owners typically have to accept the BAFs proposed by ocean carriers. However, widespread distrust of the carrier fuel surcharge mechanism may have the effect of pushing more shippers towards coming up with their own BAF formula to have greater control of a process.

While Loadsmart is far from the only startup to take on the idea of automating certain parts of the truck brokerage business — Convoy, Transfix, and Uber Freight are the most notable names in this movement — the former has been on a different growth path.

The International Longshoremen’s Association’s boycott of the 44th Congress of the International Transport Workers’ Federation, which begins Sunday, provides additional evidence that the introduction of further automation will not be a quick and simple process.

Transplace, with headquarters in Frisco, Texas, near Dallas, has been growing rapidly in recent years and expects to move $8 billion through its network this year.

End-to-end visibility will make supply chains more efficient, Chicago-based project44’s President Tommy Barnes says, but only if shippers use data received to collaborate with partners.

The Container Shipping Lines’ Association of India, in its latest report to the Ministry of Shipping, argued that cabotage relaxation has paid off with significant transshipment gains for Indian ports during September.

The Eagle GO Guaranteed Service — targeting shippers willing to pay premium rates for a faster and guaranteed service that provides a complete refund if the ocean carrier fails to meet the delivery date — will expand from 29 Asia ports to 150 Asia and Middle East ports.

For those who think that it’s somehow counterintuitive to have a pricing model designed to create a loss or to reduce operating margins, rest assured, it is.

Innovation and outside-the-box thinking are needed to help shippers and trucking companies kick old, bad habits and bring pricing into the 21st century. This is Part 1 in a 5-part series.

From warehousing to trucking, US employers are rushing to get workers in place for the peak shipping season — and another, likely substantial, increase in end-of-year e-commerce purchases and deliveries.

In the decade ahead, the Port of New York and New Jersey will face intensifying competition — from multiple ports — for discretionary cargo. With the authority’s head of seaport departing, the moment requires the hiring of a leader with in-depth knowledge and experience overseeing container cargo moves through a complex, multimodal system.

As uncertain as trans-Pacific rates have been, they are up 56 percent to the West Coast and 67 percent to the East Coast, compared with early Oct. 2017. However, more price volatility is anticipated as the peak season ends, importers prepare for the Chinese New Year, and proposed 25 percent Trump administration tariffs take effect on Jan. 1.

The announcement is yet another decision to condense CSX’s vast intermodal network into precision scheduled railroading.

Bharat Mumbai Container Terminal, which commenced full-fledged operations in February, increased volume substantially — powered by more ship calls — and notched a new, impressive quayside productivity rate, on the strength of crane upgrades.

Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust handles the majority of India’s container freight and, as such, that connectivity improvement is extremely significant for the emerging market economy — and for shippers.

Dwell times at Vancouver rail facilities are approaching last winter’s levels, when port congestion was the worst in years, but terminal operators say the factors driving the current delays are not a harbinger.

A chassis split creates two extra stops for truckers, wasting their on-duty hours, reducing asset productivity, and restricting available capacity to shippers.

The expansion is a bet on the continuing strength of the US economy — and Old Dominion has a record of success when it comes to matching demand and capacity with price and avoiding inefficiencies.

In mid-May, top officials from Nepal, led by Nepal Ambassador to Bangladesh Professor Chop Lal Bhusal, visited Banglabandha land port to see the transit route and how the nation’s goods would reach Chittagong and Mongla ports.

China’s government has invested billions in the China-Europe rail network, and volume, propelled by subsidies, has surged. However, those subsidies have created other downsides for shippers and the broader market.

A survey conducted by global shipping consultancy Drewry found considerable unease among global shippers and forwarders ahead of the low-sulfur fuel implementation. Concern was expressed by respondents about ocean carriers’ methods of fuel cost recovery with more than half, 56 percent, stating that they did not consider their service providers’ existing approaches as either fair or transparent.

Protesters Wednesday morning blocked all access points to Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust, bringing container movement to a halt. The stoppage was tentatively called off later in the day, after authorities agreed to hold talks with demonstrators on Oct. 10 regarding a new package deal.

It’s an axiom that certainly applies in the current US intermodal market: shop around. Even if they’re under contract, not every rate is better than spot truckload. And these price comparisons can save shippers money when every cent counts towards remaining within transportation budgets.

The port authority, after discussions with rule-implementer the New Jersey Department of Labor, is disseminating detailed information to truckers on the new rules, which the authority believes will have little impact on the drayage fleet and won’t affect many truckers.

Rising transportation costs, the driver shortage, and accompanying rail and barge congestion have created challenging times for Europe’s shippers, to say the least. And then there’s the Brexit summit in two weeks.

XPO Logistics just answered Amazon’s delivery/fulfillment serve with a volley — the deployment of thousands of robotic “cobots.”

Free time periods have been reduced and tariffs for demurrage and detention have increased considerably. Marine terminals and ocean carriers counter that detention and demurrage encourages shippers to pick up and return containers in order to boost cargo fluidity that’s challenged by the larger discharges of mega-ships.

Tuesday’s job actions prompted an exchange of charges among the parties. The current round of picketing that began on Monday is expected to continue at least through Wednesday.

The Port of New York and New Jersey is looking for ways to increase the storage space for empty rail cars to prevent shortages as discretionary cargo volumes rise.

It’s the latest move in a shifting vision at CSX for the terminal, which the railroad hopes to make a central hub for Ohio freight but also includes logistical challenges for shippers and truckers.

While these two related issues are present to various degrees at other gateways, the problems are magnified in the largest US port complex, where peak-season volumes now being handled at the 12 container terminals are contributing to an annual volume of more than 16 million TEU.

By setting its internal minimum wage at $15 an hour, Amazon increases competitive pressure for blue-collar workers, especially younger workers, across industries, including trucking.

The new route connects the South Korean port of Busan and Russia’s port of St. Petersburg and involves the port of Vladivostok as a transit hub and then the Trans-Siberian Railway to move container cargo to Russia and other European destinations.