Cool Cargo News

Three companies this month have announced investments in temperature-controlled facilities near the Port of Charleston.

New Orleans Cold Storage has plans to more than double the size of its existing storage space at the Port of Charleston, South Carolina.

Dry van and flatbed spot market truck rates remained steady this week, while refrigerated trucking rates continued their upward trend.

Growth at North America’s two largest cold storage companies has mushroomed in recent years, with both looking at overseas opportunities.

Trucking is a notoriously fragmented business. The Department of Transportation estimates there are 500,000 trucking companies in the U.S., with 97 percent of them operating 20 trucks or less.

While some cold storage companies are growing rapidly, the head of one midsize warehouse company says that doesn’t apply throughout the industry.

The world’s economic focus during the 1980s and 1990s was trained on the Asian Tigers of Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan. Now Argentina’s top agricultural official says the focus is about to shift south.

Meat and produce exporters looking to bypass California’s 22-metric-ton weight limit on over-the-road shipments soon may be able to ship overweight containers to the Port of Oakland by barge.

In 1988, when the Berlin Wall was still standing and Russia was still a part of the Soviet Union, McDonald’s opened its first restaurant in Moscow. The first of the chain’s restaurants to open inside a communist country, it drew crowds and global attention. Today, McDonald’s has 35,000 restaurants in more than 100 nations.

Despite growing concerns about tight supplies and rising prices, U.S. red meat exports performed well in February...

Orbcomm, a global wireless asset-tracking company, has acquired Euroscan, expanding its product line and ability to track refrigerated containers and trailers worldwide.

U.S. red meat exports kicked off 2014 on a “positive note,” although market conditions suggest the year ahead could be “challenging,” according to statistics...

Overcapacity is a threat to container lines’ refrigerated cargo segment this year, despite projected growth in the global reefer market, according to Peter Frederiksen, a member of the executive board of Hamburg Süd.

The U.S. Food Safety Modernization Act has impacted the global food supply chain and, by extension, global reefer carriers too.

A Michigan-based company has acquired the operator of a refrigerated intermodal rail service, known as ColdTrain, and plans to at least triple Rail Logistics’ container fleet over the next five years.

Forecasters expect modest growth in U.S. and global shipments of refrigerated cargoes in containers.

On a recent day in mid-December, two 747 freighters flew into MidAmerica St. Louis Airport loaded with 250,000 pounds of Chilean blueberries. Just days later, another 160,000 pounds of the fruit landed at the airport.

New and expanding refrigerated rail services are delivering new options for smaller food shippers who soon could be left out in the cold by western railroads as thousands of 50-year-old mechanical boxcars are retired in the coming years.

Container carriers and shippers of refrigerated cargoes, facing slower transit times and more distant markets, are looking to high-tech solutions from container manufacturers.

Following a frenetic decade of ups and downs in volumes and rates, the steamship industry is seeking stability through alliances and cost-cutting that has lengthened voyage transit times. While many shippers don’t see much of a problem in slow-steaming, exporters of refrigerated goods have more reason to be concerned.

Westwood Shipping has found new use for its fleet of four BulkCon ships. The carrier, which has specialized in transporting forest products since 1892, added refrigerated cargoes to the mix in the summer of 2013.

Transportation companies soon may have new food safety regulations to follow in hauling foodstuffs in the U.S.

Using pallet-sized, battery-powered, temperature-controlled containers, Averitt Express is changing its refrigerated less-than-truckload delivery model.

The e-commerce division of India’s leading express distribution and supply chain solutions group grew at a rapid rate in the latter half of 2013...

Maersk Container Industry has teamed up with Primaira, a Boston-based technology company, to develop a high ozone air cleaning system for refrigerated containers...

U.S. red meat exports were “solid” in November as beef sales set a new value record and pork exports posted their strongest month year-to-date...

Hoffberger Holdings has plans to expand its distribution center at the Port of Baltimore.

U.S. beef exports in September remained ahead of 2012 levels, but pork exports continued to face “a number of challenges"...

A newly launched intermodal company aims to provide direct transport of produce from farms to major North American supermarkets by following the shifting growing season.

The Port of Oakland is one of the busiest reefer ports in the country. That it’s close to California’s Central Valley growing area and the last port of call for a number of carriers before vessels head back to Asia are two of the main reasons for its reefer growth.

A number of new deals are pushing China’s cold chain into a larger footprint.

Shipper acceptance of refrigerated rail has grown in the past several years as new services have proved reliable in intermodal and boxcar sectors.

The Australian red meat industry sold record amounts of beef and goat meat to China in August. China imported 19 percent of Australia’s total red meat shipments, compared with 4 percent in August 2012.

Chinese consumers soon could be in line for a lot more U.S. pork in mainland grocery stores.

Wholesale prices for lobster caught in Maine and Canada have plummeted to $2.30 a pound, about the same price commanded 25 years ago, as the annual catch grows. Most consumers, however, aren’t seeing the savings because restaurant menu prices largely haven’t dropped.

Marten Transport reported its net income in the third quarter of 2013 was a record $8.0 million, jumping 22.4 percent year-over-year from $6.5 million.

Rich Dines wants more reefer cargo moving across the docks in Long Beach.

IAG Cargo has opened a new pharmaceutical center at London Heathrow Airport, the latest step in the expansion of its Constant Climate service...

Galborg USA has upgraded its refrigerated container cargo service from Jacksonville, Fla., to ports in Namibia, South Africa and Mozambique, according to Jacksonville Port Authority.