Commentary

Europe’s CBER, which will be allowed to lapse next April, has not achieved increased competition or improved service levels provided by ocean carriers, writes industry veteran John McCauley.

With regulators watching carefully, some railroads have modified their message -- that lower expenses will actually enable them to compete more effectively for truck freight by offering better service at a lower price.

Borrowing a metaphor from the world of boxing to explain how logistics technology got to this point, many of the early champions underestimated their opponents, failed to stay in shape and punched themselves out in the early rounds of what’s proven to be a tough fight.

The work of the supply chain is underappreciated and undervalued, and from a public policy standpoint, that is the biggest long-term threat to the competitiveness of California’s ports, writes the head of the Pacific Merchant Shipping Association.

Every business should develop a risk assessment and profile for managing the obligations associated with the delivery of tangible goods, including which costs and risks they are best equipped to manage themselves as a seller or buyer.

The US faces the potential of a government shutdown in November, and importers should be considering now if their customs broker is ready to help them navigate the ensuing chaos.

FedEx has cost and pricing dynamics in its favor, and thus has a limited opportunity to cut charges for shippers to increase its market share, offer higher payments to its independent service providers, and generate a greater return for its shareholders, writes Satish Jindel.

These are issues with a myriad of complexity, but they are not beyond the ability of the talented individuals at the FMC and in our industry, who know intuitively and through their experience what is reasonable and just, writes an executive for BassTech International.

Not knowing how to navigate Incoterms rules can create true vulnerability for sellers and buyers of breakbulk and project cargo.

The South Coast Air Quality Management District (SCAQMD) is pushing an indirect source emissions rule that would hold the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach responsible for emissions they do not control, potentially forcing them to reduce cargo volumes.

Teamsters members contemplating a strike at UPS would be well advised to rethink that strategy given that the company’s competitors can provide a huge pool of non-union workers for UPS to hire, warns industry executive and consultant Satish Jindel.

The timing of the next capacity challenge remains uncertain, but is approaching steadily. By preparing now, shippers will be better positioned to win the next capacity crisis.

The FMC proposed rulemaking to restrict billing to only those parties that have entered into a contractual agreement is sound policy, and one that is welcomed by the vast majority of the supply chain community, say the heads of three motor carrier groups.

For decades, the US Postal Service has been the only parcel carrier with rates for parcels weighing in ounces, partly a result of it having a monopoly on delivering those lightweight and small-size parcels to mailboxes.

A proposed change to the billable party for detention fees would simply pass the burden from the trucker, which controls a container’s movements and is directly witness to the circumstances that can disqualify detention charges, to the cargo owner, who has no such control or visibility.

Shifting capacity landscapes have caused several changes in the US freight industry — owner-operators have become company drivers or shut down, while small carriers with 10 or fewer trucks have begun exiting the market, says the executive vice president of 3PL Redwood Logistics.

The head of the NACPC says the group believes the open market — not a chassis provider’s contract with an ocean carrier — should determine the best chassis model to employ.

A forwarder's ability to adapt and offer valuable expertise in this uncertain environment will be a crucial factor in ensuring the success of shippers and the shipping industry as a whole, writes the CEO of Freight Right.

Any effort to dictate chassis pool models would reduce competition, innovation, and capital investment, making intermodal networks less resilient for the shippers and consumers who rely on them, writes the CEO of chassis provider DCLI.

As we come to the end of a surge of historic proportions in terms of both scope and longevity, the only place for volumes to go, at least in the near term, is down.

There can be no improvement in supply chain resilience if fundamental behaviors do not change, and there is little appetite for the increased expense and reduced margins of such an approach.

The logistics industry should prepare itself for more lawsuits such as Miller v. C.H. Robinson, and for plaintiff’s attorneys to look for the deepest pockets possible — potentially including cargo owners — to satisfy judgements.

The COVID-19 pandemic, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s aggression in Ukraine, and issues surrounding China’s claim to the Taiwan Strait have brought the need for resilient and durable supply chains into sharp focus.

California needs to embrace and advance a future that strives to achieve environmental and community goals, but also preserves the job and economic contributions provided by ports in the state, the head of the Pacific Merchant Shipping Association says.

After years of “trade and customs” functions being largely considered an afterthought in supply chain decisions, a shift is afoot that would correct that.

A classification system that considers the full requirements and costs of service providers, and is constantly being adapted to new realities, is the best system available, writes the vice president of classification for the National Motor Freight Traffic Association.

While a few carriers such as ABF Freight and FedEx Freight have rolled out dimensional pricing, and others have expressed the desire to do so, they have largely overlooked the reasons for shippers’ reluctance to switch to dimensional rates.

Nobody has been willing to admit that the only question about recent supply chain failures was when — not if — they were going to occur, writes Theodore Prince.

The objective of OSRA-22 was never to address freight rates, but rather to provide the FMC with additional tools to better identify, prevent, and hold ocean carriers accountable for unfair or deceptive practices and behaviors, writes the executive director of the National Industrial Transportation League.

Paul Revere’s midnight ride to warn the colonial militia of the impending British military action was facilitated by the sexton of Boston’s North Church using a lantern signal —one if the enemy approached by land, two lights if it came by sea. These days, we would need three lanterns to indicate trouble coming from both land and sea.

Predictably, OSRA-22 overpromised and is at risk of under-delivering. Changes need to be made to mitigate the law’s unintended consequences.

Visibility aggregators face obsolescence as data standards increase the availability and usefulness of visibility data — unless they work now to deliver standalone functional value before the enterprise resource planning (ERP) and freight management systems in the operating layer co-opt their capabilities and value.

The railroad industry’s previously inexhaustible supply of goodwill is rapidly dwindling as a recent avalanche of adverse publicity brings to the surface a long-standing undercurrent of discontent with the rail industry.

Many motor carriers perform street turns when they can, but there’s never been a way to perform them at scale.

Why do logistics companies use the few hundred years of experience from their boards of directors, the first line of management, and a few above-average employees, and leave the many thousand years of experience of the rest of the workforce out of the picture?

For many, the National Motor Freight Classification (NMFC) system for pricing has long outlived its need and value.