The Trump administration’s imposition of hefty tariffs on Brazil in August sent US bookings for coffee, sugar and orange juice plummeting in the first half of September.

The terminal would cement the port’s status as the biggest gateway in South America, boosting its annual container capacity by almost 60% and allowing it to handle 20,000-TEUs ships, many of those from Asia.

The waterway has the capacity to handle 36 daily transits, but ACP Administrator Ricaurte Vásquez Morales told a media briefing the average is projected to land at only 33 next year.

The suspension of the TP9/WC6 service from Xiamen and Busan is the latest effort by carriers to stem declining container spot rates and adjusting capacity to softening demand.

US retailers increased September and October import volume expectations significantly, but it will not be enough to meet 2024 levels.

Suspension of the Pacific South 5 service comes as container lines are announcing more blanked sailings from Asia to the US in an attempt to boost spot rates ahead of China’s Golden Week.

S&P Global Market Intelligence’s Global Port Congestion Analysis shows that half of Northern Europe’s ports reported year-over-year declines in port moves per hour in the second quarter, while Asian ports faced higher arrival process times and mixed efficiency results.

Traditional retailers in the US are scaling back their space requirements, according to an annual report, as the volatility over tariffs trickles down to the industrial real estate market.

The new 335,000-square-foot facility will reduce border delays and maximize cargo capacity for shippers moving temperature-controlled loads between the US and Mexico.

Import volumes for September through December are expected to come in each month about 20% under the comparable 2024 levels, according to the latest Global Port Tracker, with tariff-linked frontloading one of the primary reasons.

The Chinese-Polish carrier won the rate-linked relief after US regulators had expressed initial concerns this spring about the Chinese government’s supposed control over the company.

The sanctions list targets the shipping interests of Mohammad Hossein Shamkhani, son of Ali Shamkhani, a political adviser to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Volumes from Oceania to the US East Coast have grown steadily during the past five years, with this June recording the most imports ever for a single month.

In the wake of several paper mill closures globally so far this year, US pulp importers will be dealt another blow on Aug. 1 when a proposed 50% tariff on cargo from Brazil will go into effect.

Despite significant injections of reefer capacity in early 2025, US cold chain stakeholders say they continue to face equipment scarcity issues.

But the mini rush will be short-lived, with imports falling month to month between August and November, the National Retail Federation and Hackett Associates said in their latest Global Port Tracker.

Carriers are pulling back on their blanking campaigns on the Asia-ECSA lane in July after two months of blanking campaigns largely neutralized capacity additions to the lane.

The carrier said vessels on the five-day transit to Philadelphia will carry food, apparel, industrial products and consumer goods.

A new service from Green Tide Logistics will connect Veracruz to Philadelphia in five to six days via truck and multi-purpose vessels capable of handling 1,200 to 1,700 TEUs.

The fees come as dwell times for refrigerated containers in Houston exceed a week and reefer volumes topped 10,000 TEUs for the first time in three years.

Despite ongoing efforts to clear out logjams triggered by the brief work stoppage, berth waiting times for vessels arriving at the country’s busiest port have risen to their highest this year.

The China-based liners carried a combined 1.09 million TEUs in imports to the US through April, up 23% over the same period in 2024, according to Journal of Commerce rankings.

Cargo landing at the country’s ports in July will be 20% higher than the forecast made just last month by the National Retail Federation and Hackett Associates.

The shift of some capacity to the Asia-US trade to meet surging demand there is contributing to tighter vessel space in the ECSA market, forwarders tell the Journal of Commerce.

While terminal operators had hoped that problems stemming from the mid-May work stoppage would be mostly over, forwarders are still reporting cargo delays.

A portion of the money will be used for Project 11, which will ultimately allow an additional 1,400 vessels of all types to call the port each year by deepening portions of the channel to accommodate larger ships. 

The Cedar Port industrial park and barge port says the construction of a new ship channel could pave the way for potential development of a container terminal at the site.

The Port of Los Angeles took the top spot for containerized imports in 2024 and edged out Houston and Savannah as the busiest gateway for exports.

Container lines are looking to capitalize on a ramp-up in Asia-US bookings during the 90-day tariff reduction that followed Monday’s deal between the Trump administration and China.

Rates are climbing quickly amid fresh Chinese volumes headed to the US, with an expected crunch in vessel capacity and the potential for port congestion driving the gains. 

The investment will increase the Port of Caucedo’s capacity by 24% while expanding an adjacent Free Trade Zone, the terminal operator said.

The National Retail Federation also warned the negative growth will accelerate, with imports through the summer expected to be at least 20% lower than the corresponding month last year. 

The main heavy-lift components needed for datacenters are cooling infrastructure such as large-scale air conditioners and backup power infrastructure such as batteries, diesel generators and transformers.

PSA BDP acquired a majority stake in Mexico-based forwarder ED International, expanding PSA’s cross-border forwarding network.

Interest in FTZs, where shippers can store goods while deferring the payment of duties, has increased dramatically since President Donald Trump implemented tariffs in April.

Lineage will acquire four existing warehouses in the US from Tyson and develop two other next-generation facilities where the food conglomerate will be the anchor tenant.

With far fewer US-bound goods leaving Chinese docks, carriers have accelerated the raft of blank sailings and service suspensions that began earlier this month, sources tell the Journal of Commerce.

Amid the US-China trade dispute, inquiries for bonded storage north of the border have increased four-fold this month, according to one Canada-based third-party logistics provider.

Carriers in the specialized cargo sector are designing contracts that would shift the cost of the US’ possible tax on Chinese tonnage to heavy-lift and project cargo shippers.

The export decline is already showing up in some data, with bookings for US exports to China for the week of April 8–15 down 5.4% from the prior week.