North American supply chain latest
While it looks like a strike has been avoided on the US West Coast, further up the coast, ILWU Canada are due to strike in Saturday, which will impact Vancouver and cargo destined for the US Mid-West, while the Panama Canal’s drought disruption continues to impact East Coast traffic.
After 13 months of negotiation ILWU members on the US West Coast have secured a 32% salary increase over the life of the next six-year contract, the deal has yet to be ratified, in a process which may take three months.
The tentative agreement and the likelihood of ratification by the ILWU in California was expected to reduce the leverage of both the ILWU Canada and the British Colombia Maritime Employers Association, in their Vancouver talks, where the cargo throughput is far smaller than through US ports.
ILWU Canada said its members will walk off the job as of 8 a.m. West Coast time on Saturday 1st July, with not end date specified, because the BCMEA has “refused to negotiate on the main issues.
Urgent talks have resumed on wages and automation in the hope that a deal can be struck soon to shorten, if not completely avert a strike
The potential impact of a strike on container operations at Vancouver, which is a gateway for the US Mid-West, is unclear with five container ships at berth currently.
Hopes that forecast rain would alleviate the Panama Canal’s drought conditions have been dashed, with vessel draught restrictions likely to be in place for the rest of the year, with bottlenecks of ships and vessels forced to carry less cargo to stay within the strict draught limits.
The draught regulations could force some of the larger container ships to reduce their load by 40% and considering almost 150 neo-panamax container ships transited the Panama Canal in April, there could be significant ramifications for US importers, with Hapag-Lloyd already introducing a Panama Canal Charge of $500 per container.
Currently vessel movements through the canal are down over 20%, with 60 ships waiting and limits imposed to try and safeguard water levels, which are not expected to recover before November, which is bad news for East Coast cargo, which transits the Canal en-route from Asia.
If you ship into the United States we can review your situation, explain your options and, if necessary, consider alternative access ports into Canada or the United States.
We are US experts, with daily import/export air freight services, full load container departure on next vessel and weekly groupage services to most destinations.
EMAIL our managing director, Colin Redman for more information, advice and guidance.