Commentary: Hell no, we won?t load

Commentary: Hell no, we wonÆt load    Welcome to a new era in container shipping, where events half a world away can affect the timely delivery of shippers’ goods.
   Of course, shippers already knew that could happen, but usually those events were things like port congestion, bad weather, a truck breakdown (or more recently, lack of ship capacity), causing a supply chain breakdown that could ripple across the globe.
   These days, politics seems to be getting in the way of some people's supply chains, especially for shippers who happen to have their goods loaded on a Zim vessel.
   No need to rehash the specifics, but in late May, Israeli soldiers boarded a Turkish aid ship bound for Gaza and several aid workers aboard died. The international community was outraged, while Israel insisted it had a right to board the ship to enforce a blockade of Gaza, and that its soldiers were provoked by weapon-wielding passengers on the ship.

Related News •   Protest against Zim in Oakland

   Whatever one believes happened aboard the ship, the fallout in the container-shipping industry has been bizarre, if not wholly unexpected. Protests of Zim vessels arriving in ports from Malaysia to Sweden to, most recently, Oakland, have interrupted the normal pattern of goods movement for those whose cargo sits aboard Zim's ships.
   The question is, what rights do the people behind the protests have to conduct their actions? And second, do these work stoppages set a bad precedent for an industry that is actually incredibly apolitical?
   In the Malaysia work stoppage, dockworkers reportedly led the protest of a Zim vessel arriving at Port Klang. It's little surprise Malaysia might have a problem with what happened to the aid ship. The country does not recognize Israel as a state, and there were reportedly Malaysian aid workers and journalists aboard the vessel stopped by the Israeli government. Malaysia also has laws prohibiting sailors aboard Zim vessels from leaving their ships during calls there and goods of Israeli origin are not allowed.
   Israeli commercial ships have been arriving in Malaysia since 1998, but when the dockworkers there protested this month, it brought to light the fact that Zim ships are a fairly routine feature in the country. As they should be. Again, shipping is apolitical by nature.
   The problem here is that Malaysia has little to do with what transpired several thousand miles away (except, presumably, that the dockworkers in the predominantly Muslim nation stood in solidarity with those killed trying to aid Palestinians).
   By creating a speed bump in the supply chain, in which Israel-based Zim is but a small part, the dockworkers have set a worrying precedent. It's likely that most of the goods aboard the ship had nothing to do with Israel. It's also likely that many Malaysian export shippers were harmed by the disturbance.
   There's a reason why global politics and religion are rarely allowed into the arena of shipping — because only bad can come out of it. The sad thing is that Zim's calling at a port in a predominantly Muslim country could have served as a way that trade can heal rifts.
   Instead, by making a political statement laced with religious overtones, the protesters in Klang (Malaysia's busiest seaport and the closest container gateway to the capital Kuala Lumpur) have widened the rift.
   In Sweden, transport workers organized a weeklong boycott of Israeli ships and goods, June 15-24.
   'If an Israeli ship would come we would just leave it be and not work on it,” said Peter Annerback, a spokesman for the Swedish Port Workers Union.
   The union admitted, however, it would be difficult to pinpoint non-Israeli-flagged vessels with goods originating from Israel aboard.
   If Malaysia has little stake in what's happening in Gaza, Sweden has even less. Yet transport workers have deemed it O.K. to stifle the movement of legitimate cargo based on their political views.
   Finally, over the weekend, a massive protest outside the SSA Terminal in the Port of Oakland halted the unloading of a Zim vessel for more than 12 hours.
   The protest was organized by activists in the Bay Area (not by dockworkers), but the longshore union failed to cross the picket line citing safety and health provisions of their contract. Essentially, two shifts were missed when work gangs were unable, or unwilling, to cross the line.
   The Oakland protest was supported by everyone from human rights organization to Oakland's teacher's union and had the desired effect.
   'Our objective was to boycott this ship for 24 hours, and we succeeded in doing that,” Richard Becker, with the ANSWER Coalition, one of the groups that organized the protest, told the San Francisco Chronicle.
   The common thread running through all these incidents is the utter lack of connection to the events that transpired in the waters off of Gaza.
   When I think of politics getting in the way of trade, I instantly recall the DP World fiasco, in which U.S. legislators demonized a perfectly legitimate container terminal operating company apparently because its headquarters were in the Middle East. That stain won't soon go away.
   But these protests have the potential to be even more insidious, because really, what in the world do a few protesters in Oakland or Sweden have to do with what went down on that aid ship?
   To look at this another way, why didn’t anyone in Oakland or Malaysia or Sweden decide to protest the arrival of a COSCO ship for the Chinese government’s heavy-handed approach to Uighur Muslims in western China, where far more people died? What should stop someone in Sweden from protesting the arrival of a United Arab Shipping Co. vessel for some Arab nations' unprogressive attitude toward women’s rights? Heck, I suppose Maersk could be picketed if someone gets served a flat can of Carlsberg beer or a piece of gouda that’s gone bad.
   That longshoremen actually led the protests (as in Malaysia) or honored them (as apparently they have in Oakland) means that the supply chain has been interrupted. If I’m a shipper with the Grand Alliance (with exchanges slots with Zim on the transpacific) and my cargo ends up in a Zim ship bound for Oakland, what recourse do I have to ensure that these protests don’t interfere with the legitimate movement of my goods? The answer is none.
   Dockworkers have every right to strike and protest for better pay and working conditions, or to protest the treatment of someone directly involved in their line of work. But when they start protesting political events that happen half a world away, it sets a bad precedent for the supply chain. ' Eric Johnson