American Shipper

   The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration and Australia’s Department of Resources, Energy and Tourism have reached a memorandum of understanding to continue research and development of clean, sustainable alternative aviation fuels.    “Air travel is global and we need international partners to develop these innovative new fuels,” U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said. “Our ultimate […]

   OOCL and Freightliner said Thursday they have renewed a 10-year strategic partnership to provide OOCL customers with U.K. intermodal services.    Under the new contract, OOCL has committed to increase capacity by 50 percent, with daily wagons being linked between the Freightliner terminal at the Port of Southampton to their strategic terminal networks at […]

   Politicians from European cities Brussels, Berlin, Budapest, Paris and Vienna plan to sign a charter on Friday to “step up the dialogue with the inland ports authorities and take the necessary decisions in view of tackling the growing challenges in terms of urban freight supply and distribution.”    The charter will be presented to […]

   U.S.-flag Great Lakes freighters carried 10.4 million tons of dry bulk cargo in August, 3.7 percent more than in August 2010.    Iron ore volume was 4.8 million tons, up 8 percent; limestone was 2.9 million tons, up almost 21 percent; and coal was 2.2 million tons, down 7.5 percent.    Through the end […]

  U.S. Trade and Development Agency (USTDA) awarded a $593,954 grant to PT Kereta Api Indonesia (PT KAI), Indonesia’s state-owned railroad, to develop a strategic plan and system recommendations for upgrading its rail signaling and telecommunications systems.    The grant will fund a technical assistance program that includes a review of existing rail transport corridors, […]

FAA, highway funding crisis averted

Associations urged Senate to promptly confirm Eric L. Hirschhorn as the Commerce Department’s undersecretary for export administration.

   Descartes Systems Group had second quarter net profit of $2.6 million, 30 percent more than the $2 million earned in the same period a year earlier.    Revenue was $28.8 million in the quarter ending July 31, up 14 percent from $25.2 million in the second quarter last year.    The Waterloo, Ontario-based logistics […]

  Exel, the North American contract logistics unit of DHL Supply Chain, said it will build a 250,000-square-foot distribution center in Laredo, Texas, to serve as a hub for shipping across the U.S.-Mexico border.    Officials expect to complete the multiclient facility, which will meet the highest security and environmental certifications, by July 2012.    […]

   A federal judge in Tacoma, Wash., on Thursday found the International Longshore and Warehouse Union and two of its locals in contempt of a temporary restraining order it had issued earlier this month. 

  The Port of Antwerp will begin constructing the world’s largest lock near Deurganckdock on the left bank of the Scheldt River.    The Belgian port already has the biggest lock, the Berendrecht lock. The new Deurganckdock lock will be even deeper than the Berendrecht, to handle the increasingly larger containerships. It will have a […]

Washington Notebook By Eric Kulisch    Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood recently pointed in his blog to two construction projects as examples of the type of infrastructure upgrades the United States needs to maintain an efficient and safe transportation system that can support economic activity.    One is the modernization of the control tower at Oakland […]

   Maersk Line said this week it has adjusted its Asia/Mediterranean service network, adding calls in Valencia and La Spezia and narrowing rotations on services connecting its key Asian origin ports with Port Said in Egypt.    The adjustments affect five services — four operated by Maersk and one by CMA CGM on which the […]

   Maersk Line said this week it is seeking rate increases on a host of global trades.    From Oct. 1, the line plans these increases:    • Southeast Asia to Australia, $300 per 20-foot container and $600 per 40-foot container.    • Northern Europe to the East Coast of South America, $150 per 20-foot […]

  Horizon Lines said Wednesday it has closed on a bridge loan facility of up to $25 million from a group on noteholders and reached an agreement with its existing bank group to amend its current credit facility to accommodate the bridge loan.    It also said it has made a $7 million payment to […]

   Maersk Line will in October switch its TA2 service calls at the Port of New York-New Jersey from the APM Terminals facility to the Maher Terminals facility, the line said this week.    APMT is Maersk Line’s sister company. The switch will occur Oct. 9.    The TA2 has a rotation of Rotterdam, Felixstowe, […]

   Mediterranean Shipping Co. said Wednesday it has suspended its planned peak season surcharge from the Far East to eastern Mediterranean and Black Sea ports.    The line had originally planned a fee, $225 per TEU, from Sept. 5, but delayed it until Sept. 15.    Now the line is abandoning it altogether.    Liner […]

   UPS Wednesday said it will launch on Oct. 3 a new product called UPS My Choice, which is designed to make it easier for receivers of parcels to avoid missed deliveries.    The company said out of the 5 million or so homes it visits each day, it leaves 100,000 to 200,000 missed delivery […]

  The U.S. Trade and Development Agency signed a grant agreement with the Middle Airports Corp. (MAC) to help expand Chu Lai International Airport, Vietnam’s largest airfield.    The grant will fund a feasibility study of the Chu Lai Airport becoming a regional cargo hub, thus helping to increase the operations of U.S. cargo carriers […]

   The University of Leicester in the United Kingdom is studying the impact of volcanic ash on jet engines to better advise the airline industry on whether it is safe to fly following an explosive volcanic eruption.    The study, led jointly by Hongbiao Dong of the Department of Engineering and Mike Branney of the […]

   Cargoitalia, Italy’s all-cargo airline, has appointed Molocon Logistics Consulting, a specialist aviation-marketing consultancy based in Germany, to conduct a full review of its system-wide sales and customer relations functions.    “The review is part of a wider reappraisal of the airline’s operations, designed to better position it to respond to recent adverse market,” the […]

   Swissport International, a provider of ground services to the aviation sector, has appointed a new management team to run its ground handling operations at Brussels Airport.    Marcel Buelens will serve as chief executive officer, and Alex Weidmann as chief operating officer for ground handling operations in Brussels. Swissport Cargo Services will remain under […]

   NYK Line North America said it will no longer routinely provide chassis in the Northeast, including in the New York-New Jersey market, effective Nov. 14.    NYK said the change would “build efficiencies while minimizing the environmental impact of having a large number of chassis that are used intermittently and have to be stored […]

CSCMP cultivates university-led research to benefit careers of members. By Chris Gillis    The Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals has long been a gathering point for serious supply chain managers to network and exchange ideas and best practices, and it’s only natural that more academics and researchers specializing in this field have also gravitated […]

Ex-CBP chiefs: Congress misguided on border security

  Southern California’s container ports said volume fell 8 percent in August to 1.26 million TEUs, including a 12.3 percent throughput drop at the Port of Long Beach.    Long Beach’s August volume fell to 525,929 TEUs, including a 14.2 percent drop in loaded imports to 267,198 TEUs.    Los Angeles’ volume fell 5.3 percent […]

On Second thought… By Beth Peterson    Have you ever been sitting in a corporate meeting trying to explain why global trade compliance is important, and all you get back are blank stares?    Over the years I’ve come to realize that a company’s lack of understanding of the basics of global trade has absolutely […]

   A federal appeals court has ruled the Occupational Safety and Health Administration may regulate so-called “vertical tandem lifts” (VTLs) of containers or flat racks, where more than one container or flat rack is lifted at a time. (National Maritime Safety Association v. Occupational Safety & Health Administration, D.C. Circuit. No. 09-1050. June 17.)    […]

New UP facility will bring together bulk agriculture grain, empty containers. By Chris Dupin    Union Pacific Railroad will give agriculture exporters another way to tap the plentiful supply of empty containers in Southern California with a facility slated to open late this summer in Yermo, Calif.    The new facility will be able to […]

   Piracy worldwide costs the international economy $7 billion to $12 billion per year, according to a December study by One Earth Future Foundation, a non-profit organization that seeks to solve global problems through improved governance that incorporates the expertise of the business community and civil organizations.    A more recent and robust study by […]

   Maersk Line made news in late June when the container line said it will begin assessing a $100-per-container no-show fee on bookings that fail to materialize.    Unlike simple no-show penalties of the past, the new initiative is an attempt at quid pro quo. If Maersk has overbooked on a sailing and has to […]

   NATO’s bombardment of Libyan government facilities in an effort to drive Col. Muammar Qaddafi from power continues.    Libya is a small country and the loss of trade opportunities due to hostilities is having minimal impact on the global economy, although individual companies in Europe and elsewhere are certainly suffering from the loss of […]

Education key to NVO’s plan to complement Obama’s export call. By Chris Dupin    If President Obama wants to double exports in the next five years, he could do worse than find more businessmen who think like Daniel L. Gardner.    Named chief executive officer of Ocean World Lines (OWL) in January, Gardner notes that […]

  For the better part of the past decade transportation management systems (TMS) vendors and consumers have complained about SAP’s ability to “freeze” their market with promises of a new release that never seemed to materialize.    In June, SAP, the German business software giant, made good on its promise with the long-awaited release of […]

Experts say it’s better to report attempted wrongdoing to federal regulators. By Chris Gillis    If a buyer makes a questionable export request, the smart company would turn down the business.    However, the more diligent company would take the matter a step further by reporting the suspicious activity to federal authorities in charge of […]

2010 logistics costs go up despite better inventory management, study says. By Eric Kulisch    U.S. logistics costs increased 10.4 percent, or $114 billion, to $1.2 trillion in 2010 because there were more shipments as the economy recovered from the recession and indirect costs for storing inventory increased, according to the 22nd annual State of […]

2011 was not expected to see strong economic growth. Walter Kemmsies chief economist, Moffatt & Nichol   Given the poor performance of the U.S. economy year to date, it is worth reviewing the 2011 outlook published last December (“Better, not great,” pages 14-17).    The key points were:    • “For 2011 a 2.4 percent […]

   ComPair Data and SeaIntelligence.com have teamed up to produce a quarterly benchmark report analyzing contract rates and allocated capacity on trades to and from the United States. This report examines data from the last two quarters of 2010 and the first two quarters of 2011, measuring allocated capacity figures and rates at the end […]

Top 20 container lines

Mid-size lines spearhead the latest wave of big-ship orders. Backed into a corner by the changing dynamics of container shipping, a handful of the world’s top liner carriers finally made their move in the last 12 months. That is to say, they entered into the mega-vessel market, ordering ships of massive scale and equally massive […]

Companies attempt to put an idea from the 1920s into the shipping industry's environmental playbook. By Chris Dupin    There is renewed interest in an 85-year-old technology that may help shipping companies lower fuel costs and reduce their impact on the environment.    It's called the Flettner rotor, after German engineer and inventor Anton Flettner, […]

NOL head Ron Widdows to retire at year’s end, as Singapore company goes through transition. By Eric Johnson    It’s hard to precisely quantify the impact that NOL President and Chief Executive Officer Ron Widdows has had on the industry he’s served for most of the past four decades.    There are 1,018 search results […]

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Pirates demonstrate coordinated logistics approach in spreading mayhem. By Eric Kulisch    In the last year, pirates have quadrupled their zone of operation in the Indian Ocean, from 600 nautical miles off the coast of East Africa to the tip of India, and have become more violent.    A multinational military presence has reduced the […]

Report focuses on vulnerable trade hubs, suggests shippers plan now for how to contend with a major disruption. By Eric Johnson It’s hard to wrap one’s arms around the idea of supply chain security, and there are a couple of reasons. For one, no two companies have the same profile, meaning every company is exposed […]

CSX, Ports America put Baltimore on container map despite distance from ocean. By Eric Kulisch    The Port of Baltimore, relegated to the lower tier of harbors in the container trade for the better part of 20 years, is poised for significant growth as new wharf and intermodal investments get underway and private sector partners […]

   It seems the more the liner carriers near their destination, the more they’re slip, sliding away.    That destination is maintaining a positive bottom line through properly managed assets and sustainable freight rates for container transport. They — the top 15 publicly traded liner carriers — mostly accomplished this in 2010 through tightly controlled […]

On Second Thought … Thomas Nightingale Chief Marketing officer, Con-way Inc. board of directors Transport Marketing and Sales Association nightingale.tom@con-way.com    The Transportation Worker Identification Credential was launched with the best of intentions, spurred by the tragic events of 9/11.    With security measures heightening everywhere, Congress, through the Maritime Transportation Security Act, established what […]

High-tech CSX hub takes intermodal to next level.    Companies like CSX are applying new approaches to increase the density and efficiency of new intermodal terminals.    These include stacking stored containers trackside, using cantilevered, wide-span electric cranes that can cross several tracks at once, employing advanced software to optimize the order of lifts, and […]

OAKLAND    Matson has ended one of its two U.S./China services a year after it was launched, citing sustained high fuel prices, downward rate pressure and overcapacity in the transpacific trade.    Matson in late August discontinued its expanded China-Long Beach Express service (CLX2), which includes service between Hong Kong, Yantian, Shanghai and Long Beach. […]

Improved demand brings return for German heavy-lift specialist’s westbound service from India to Europe. By Eric Johnson    Here’s a peek into how the recent economic recession affected trade regions differently: through the dark days of the crisis, project cargo and heavy-lift specialist carrier Rickmers-Linie continued to serve India from Europe, but there wasn’t nearly […]

   It’s been said low ocean freight rates can’t induce demand. Consumers either want their extra-large flat-screen TVs or they don’t, and the price of such products relies little on the ocean rate makers like Sony or Samsung can secure at a given time.    So if carriers can’t compel customers to ship more with […]

   Airlines had a difficult time making a profit during the first half of the year, but industry executives feel more confident about being in the black going forward as concerns about soaring fuel prices have abated in recent weeks, according to a survey on airline business confidence.    The survey, conducted each quarter by […]

   It seems only natural to think the bigger the customs broker the more import entries they can efficiently process.    However, that’s not actually the case. A recent survey of 140 industry executives by Kewill found productivity, or the number of monthly customs entries per full-time customs employee, peaked with mid-sized broker operations, and […]

    American Shipper’s International Transportation Management Systems (ITMS) Benchmark Study, published November 2010 (available for free at www.AmericanShipper.com/ITMS), demonstrated that shippers use an average of about four-and-a-half IT systems to manage international transportation, while best-in-class firms or “winners” actually use more.      More technology isn’t necessarily a good thing. Most likely these shippers have adopted […]

APL Logistics rebuilds domestic intermodal business a decade after selling double-stack business to Pacer. By Chris Dupin    It’s back to the future at APL Logistics as the company rebuilds its domestic intermodal business a dozen years after selling it to Pacer International.    APL, as American President Lines, pioneered double-stack intermodal rail and 53-foot […]

Soviet era-built AN-124s still reign as world’s dominant super-heavy haulers. By Chris Gillis    The world’s biggest commercial cargo planes, the Antonov 124s, didn’t feel the downdraft of the most recent global recession.    The planes’ handful of operators mostly benefited from pre-existing long-term project cargo transport contracts, which often take several years to complete, […]

Sputtering recovery translates into fewer shipments. By Eric Kulisch    Growth has been choppy since the U.S. economy pulled out of recession two years ago, alternating between lukewarm and anemic expansion.    Most economists have minimized the likelihood that the U.S. or global economies will fall into decline again, but economic data and shipment volumes […]

  Congress has introduced legislation that would impose a national policy for regulating discharges of ballast water to prevent the introduction of invasive species. The bill, H.R. 2840, also aims to regulate incidental “gray water” discharges from ships ranging from oily water separator effluent and refrigeration and air condensate effluent.    Reps. Frank LoBiondo, R-N.J., […]

   Liner carrier CSAV will end its Marco Polo service between India, the Middle East and South Africa as it joins a similar Mediterranean Shipping Co. service as a slot buyer, according to American Shipper affiliate ComPair Data.    The last voyage of the service is to depart Thursday from Durban.    In July the […]

Balling    Niels Kim Balling, 60, a shipping executive and consultant has died.    Balling was a managing director at Econships, a management advisory for transport and logistics headquartered in Hong Kong.    He had been a managing director at MISC Integrated Logistics and group vice president at MISC Bhd, a general manager and director […]

Eng    Eng Aik Meng, former president of Singapore-based liner carrier APL, has joined an Indian-based health care conglomerate as its new chief operating officer, according to news reports.    Eng will be charged with developing Fortis Healthcare’s business outside of India, primarily across Asia and Australia.    He left APL at the end of […]

   The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration has approved certification of Envirotainer’s RKN e1 electrical heating and compressor cooling air cargo container.    Envirotainer, pioneer of the world’s first active temperature-controlled container in 1995, has experienced significantly increased demand for its RKN e1 since it was first approved by the European Air Safety Agency (EASA) in […]

   Houston’s Ellington Air Cargo Facility, a property adjacent to the Ellington Air Field, is ready for development, said Project Director Mark Briggs.    “The Ellington Air Cargo Facility is the first of its kind in Houston,” Briggs said. “Not only does it offer the lowest cargo tariff in the Houston Airport System, it also […]

   Singapore Airlines Cargo has added Jakarta to its freighter network and increased its weekly frequencies to Auckland, Shanghai, Sydney and Xiamen.    The new weekly Boeing 747-400 freighter service to Jakarta’s Soekarno-Hatta International Airport started on Sept. 5. It is to be increased to twice weekly during the winter.   The carrier said the Jakarta […]

   Russian Railways subsidiaries RZD Logistics and TransContainer will cooperate in a joint venture to offer shippers express container trains.    The express service is being tested on the route between Yekaterinburg and St. Petersburg.    Fast container trains will offer a convenient and reliable shipping service to Urals-based steel exporters, said According to RZD […]

   The U.S. House of Representatives Tuesday in two separate votes approved extensions to Federal Aviation Administration and surface transportation programs that were due to expire in the coming days.    The FAA bill will keep aviation programs running through the end of January while authorization for highway and transit programs is extended through March […]

   Transportation and energy ministers from 21 economies in the Asia-Pacific region, including the United States, on Tuesday agreed to continue initiatives for cleaner and more energy-efficient transportation in the region.    The announcement came during the first-ever joint Transportation and Energy Ministerial Conference held in San Francisco by the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), the […]

van der Jagt    Nicolette van der Jagt, the long-time secretary general of the European Shippers’ Council, will become director general of CLECAT, the European association for forwarding, transport, logistics and custom services.    She will succeed Marco Sorgetti, who is leaving CLECAT to become the director general of FIATA in Zurich, effective Jan 1. […]

   A.P. Moller’s freight forwarding and supply chain management subsidiary Damco has begun providing customers with an online calculation of carbon dioxide emissions.    The new information is available online at myDamco, the browser-based customer interface with Damco, and will enable customers to track carbon dioxide emissions for all products shipped by ocean and air. […]

   Marine terminal equipment manufacturer Cargotec has opened a marine service company in Klaipeda, Lithuania.    The new company, MacGregor BLRT Baltic UAB, is a joint venture owned by Cargotec (51 percent) and Western Shipyard (49 percent).    “In Baltic, cargo access equipment repairs and annual maintenance are mainly carried out during dry docking repairs […]

Analysis: Daily Maersk a tough act to follow

   The U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee has criticized the Department of Homeland Security for its handling of Jones Act waivers in a report accompanying the DHS Appropriations Act (H.R. 2017).     The Jones Act requires goods moving between U.S. ports be moved on U.S. crewed, flagged and built vessels, but the Senate said, “U.S. vessels, […]

   California’s clean fuel regulations and voluntary slowdowns by shipping companies have substantially reduced air pollution caused by commercial cargo ships near the state’s shore, according to a study published online Monday in Environmental Science & Technology.     The study, led by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), examined a containership operating under a […]

   A new report by Drewry Maritime Research projects that by 2014, about 74 percent of reefer cargo will move on containerships instead of purpose-built breakbulk reefer vessels.     Drewry’s latest Reefer Shipping Market Annual Review and Forecast 2011/12, said 12-month charter rates for conventional reefer ships continue to fall after a 10 percent drop […]

   Container carrier Hamburg Süd and the classification society Germanischer Lloyd said they are jointly developing a data management system for systematically capturing information about shipboard emissions.     Data recorders installed on ships collect information that is then fed automatically to a central server located at Germanischer Lloyd from which queries and reports can be […]

   Yehuda “Yuli” Ofer, 87, who with brother Sammy co-founded one of the world’s largest shipping companies, dies late Sunday night at his home in Herzliya, Israel.     Sammy, 89, died in June.     The Ofer Brothers Group is a wide-ranging conglomerate that among other things owns and operates Israel’s largest privately owned shipping enterprise. […]

    Titan Salvage, a Crowley Maritime Corp. company, has appointed Dan Dolson to operations manager for the Americas.     Dolson has responsibility for the operations and profitability of Titan’s U.S. office and depot in Pompano, Fla. He will relocate to Florida from Bellevue, Wash., and report to Titan Vice President Richard Habib. Dolson has more […]

   Old Dominion Freight Line said Monday it has opened a new service center in Madison, Wis.     The center is designed to complement Old Dominion’s four existing service centers in Wisconsin, where the trucking industry hauls roughly 90 percent of the state’s manufactured tonnage. The 24-door facility is intended for a radius of 50 […]

   Congress is poised to pass bills providing short-term extensions for aviation and surface transportation programs without which funding for non-essential services would expire. Congressional leaders reached a deal on both measures late Friday.     According to Politico.com, the agreement would provide the Federal Aviation Administration $5.4 billion to keep the agency running through the […]

   The U.S. Department of Agriculture said Monday that after 10 years of negotiations, U.S. cherries can now be exported to Western Australia, making cherries the first U.S. fresh fruit to gain access to that market.     The market opening positions Australia as the seventh most valuable export market for U.S. cherries, USDA said. U.S. […]

    On Monday at Round 8 of the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations in Chicago, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative issued a white paper outlining a new USTR strategic initiative, Trade Enhancing Access to Medicines (TEAM).     TEAM offers trade policy tools to promote trade and reduce obstacles to access to both new and generic […]

   Wayne State University’s School of Business Administration, with support from General Motors, is bringing in logistics students from across the country to Detroit on Sept. 22-25 for an in-depth look at the supply chain systems that support the automotive industry and its high-tech vehicles.     The General Motors-Wayne State University Supply Chain Case Competitio, […]

   Maersk Line on Monday unveiled a new concept for its westbound Asia/Europe customers aimed a providing a fixed transportation time for goods shipped from four key Asian ports to three northern European ports.     The product, Daily Maersk, will provide shippers a daily cutoff at each of the four Asian ports, compared to less […]

allreports

   Washington State’s two U.S. senators have asked the U.S. Federal Maritime Commission to investigate the extent to which the federal Harbor Maintenance Tax (HMT) and “other factors” are causing U.S.-bound cargo to be routed through ports in Canada and Mexico. In a letter to FMC Chairman Richard A. Lidinsky Jr., Sens. Patty Murray Sen. […]

    Asia/Europe ocean freight rates continued their nosedive in July, according to the latest figures from Container Trades Statistics (CTS), which gathers volume and price information from carriers on trades to and from Europe.     CTS’s rate index on westbound head-haul Asia/Europe shipments dropped below 80 (the benchmark is 100) in July, its lowest point […]

    Maritime analyst SeaIntel on Monday released a new measure of liner carrier reliability.     The SeaIntel Global Liner Schedule Reliability report will track, on a monthly basis, 1,300 vessels arriving at more than 200 ports globally, with reliability figures given on 16 global trade lanes.     The first report, which looks at July and […]

   Liner carrier CMA CGM is altering the rotation of a service linking the U.S. East Coast and the Caribbean ahead of the suspension of its Black Pearl service between the U.S. East Coast, the Caribbean and the northern coast of South America.    The line’s Cagema service has added calls at New York and […]

   The Antwerp Port Authority said Friday it has appointed three representatives in South America to promote the port and strengthen existing contracts.    The new representatives, Chile-based Fernando Bustamante and German Calderon, and Brazil-based Henrique Machado Rabelo, “will exploit his own niche, network and specialization, creating closer links with manufacturers (shippers) and the shipping […]

     The ports of Seattle and Tacoma said they resumed normal operations on Friday, following a one-day wildcat strike Thursday by workers sympathetic with International Longshore and Warehouse Union demands that they should be employed at a new grain terminal in the Port of Longview in Washington.      Protesters vandalized the EGT terminal early Thursday […]

    Washington-based United Fresh Produce Association has put its support behind two pilot programs designed to enhance the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s ability to trace products responsible for food-borne illness outbreaks.    FDA announced last week the pilots, required under the Food Safety Modernization Act, will be carried out by the nonprofit Institute for […]

   Swiss logistics company Kuehne + Nagel has extended the contracts of its top management, the company said Friday.    K + N’s board of directors extended the contracts of Chief Executive Officer Reinhard Lange through 2013, Chief Financial Officer Gerard van Kesteren until mid-2014 and Dirk Reich, executive vice president of contract logistics and […]

New cranes arrive at Jacksonville Port Authority’s Blount Island Marine Terminal.     The Port of Jacksonville said two new container cranes have arrived at its Blount Island Marine Terminal.     The cranes are worth $10 million each, stand 170 feet tall and weigh 1,050 tons. Each crane boasts a 145-foot front reach and can lift […]

Bersin     Reports of a potential al-Qaeda plot against Washington or New York around the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks led to a heightened state of alert for law enforcement and intelligence authorities, but normal precautions didn’t result in delays for travelers and shippers moving across the border, U.S. Customs and Border Protection […]

    CMA CGM has started a service between eastern Russia and China as it drops out of a slot-buying agreement with FESCO on the same trade, according to American Shipper affiliate ComPair Data.     The French line has started its Russian Far East Express service with a rotation of Chiwan, Ningbo, Shanghai, Busan, Vostochny, Busan […]

   T. Parker Host has purchased all the outstanding shares of NSA Agencies, adding offices in Houston; New Orleans; Mobile, Ala.; and Tampa, Fla.    NSA Agencies (successor to Navios Ship Agency) will now become part of the T. Parker Host group. George Duffy has led NSA for more than 30 years, and T. Parker […]

   Intra-Asia carrier T.S. Lines has joined a shuttle between Japan and Shanghai operated by Grand China Shipping, according to research from American Shipper affiliate ComPair Data.     The carrier has joined the EKX service, which operates with one vessel by Grand China, on a rotation of Shanghai, Osaka, Kobe and Shanghai.     According to […]

    The head of one of the world’s largest aircraft leasing companies said he is nervous over the prospect of plane manufacturers Airbus and Boeing increasing production by up to 50 percent in the next few years, according to a report over the weekend from Dow Jones Newswires.     “The production increase plans make […]

    DHL Express has begun direct daily Boeing 757 air freight service between its Cincinnati and Panama hubs, the company said Friday.     The service, DHL said, improve delivery times by one day from any location in the United States, Canada, Asia and the Caribbean Islands to Panama and from Panama to all DHL destinations […]