Long Beach’s box traffic up 3% in 2003

Long Beach’s box traffic up 3% in 2003    Container traffic at the port of Long Beach, the second-largest port in the United States, grew a modest 2.9 percent last year, to 4.7 million TEUs.
   The 2.9-percent growth for 2003, after two years of virtual stagnation in volume, lifted Long Beach to a new record annual box traffic, topping the previous best of 4.6 million container units in 2000.
   The departure in the summer of 2002 of Maersk Sealand, which had accounted for a quarter of the port's container volume, still had an impact on inbound box traffic at the port last year. Citing a second-half surge in the U.S. economy and the loss of Maersk Sealand, Long Beach reported a decrease of 1.8 percent in imports for 2003, to 2.4 million TEUs. By contrast, amid economic improvement in Asia and a weakening U.S. dollar, exports from Long Beach climbed 5.8 percent to 904,539 TEUs ' the first upturn in exports since 2000. Empty containers, nearly all headed back to be re-filled overseas, jumped 10.3 percent last year, to 1.3 million TEUs.
   “A rebound in exports and the American consumers’ appetite for goods from Asia has driven cargo totals to all-time highs,” said Richard D. Steinke, port executive director at the port of Long Beach.
   The port finished the year with a record-breaking December. The total number of containers leaped 12.2 percent to 406,021 TEUs in December, with both inbound and outbound box volumes increasing.
   “With importers replenishing their inventories after a stronger-than-expected final quarter, the number of inbound loaded containers climbed to 210,094 TEUs, an increase of 12.8 percent over December 2002,” the port said.
   The number of loaded outbound containers jumped 30.6 percent to 83,941 TEUs. This was the sixth straight month that exports have shown gains over the same month a year ago. The number of empties in December was virtually the same as a year ago, at 111,986 TEUs.
   The period from November through February is historically the slowest part of the year for the port.
   The port of Los Angeles, which benefited from the addition of Maersk Sealand, has not yet released its 2003 calendar statistics.