Cargo Container Volumes Will Be Up at U.S. Ports
September will be a busy month for U.S. ports bringing in goods for the all-important Holiday shopping season.
According to Global Port Tracker, a monthly report released by the National Retail Federation and Hackett Associates, cargo volumes in September are predicted to be up a brisk 8.5 percent compared with the same month last year.Some of that can be attributed to retailers bringing in goods early in light of a possible strike in October at East Coast and Gulf Coast ports if a new longshore-worker contract isn’t hammered out by Sept. 30.
“The West Coast will benefit at least through October as cargo is diverted,” said Hackett Associates founder Ben Hackett.On the West Coast, trade volumes have been up at the Port of Los Angeles but down at the Port of Long Beach. For July, the month with the latest statistics, the Port of Los Angeles saw a 5.5 percent uptick in cargo-container volumes, totaling 726,375 20-foot containers, loaded and unloaded, compared with 688,325 containers for the same month last year.For the first seven months of the year, cargo volumes were up 6.3 percent at the Port of Los Angeles.
It’s a different story next door at the Port of Long Beach, which saw its cargo-container volumes shrink 8.8 percent in July to 522,486 20-foot containers, compared with 572,926 containers last year.
For the first seven months of this year, cargo volumes were down 5.54 percent. Last year, the Port of Long Beach lost an important terminal tenant, Hyundai Merchant Marine, which moved over to the Port of Los Angeles.
Trade volumes have been inching up every year across the country since they dropped off a cliff in 2006 and 2007. For the first half of 2012, U.S. ports received 3 percent more cargo than the previous year with cargo volume reaching 7.7 million 20-foot containers.For the entire year, cargo volumes should be up 4.2 percent to 16 million 20-foot containers.
Global Port Tracker covers ports in Los Angeles/Long Beach; Oakland, Calif.; Seattle and Tacoma, Wash.; New York/New Jersey; Hampton Roads, Va.; Charleston, S.C.; Savannah, Ga.; and Miami and Port Everglades in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. —Deborah Belgum
