Florida Shipper articles from December 2007

Florida Shipper archives from December 2007

One size fits all?
December 3, 2007... The Central America Free Trade Agreement has yet to expand apparel exports from its member states -- the five nations of Central America and the Dominican Republic. And things are not likely to get better for U.S. apparel importers because...

Washington and Caricom turn the page.
December 3, 2007... BYLINE: Andrew Carmona For the first time in 10 years, heads of state from the 15-nation Caribbean Community and the U.S. came together at the "Conference on the Caribbean: A 20/20 Vision" held in Washington, D.C., June 19-21. The...

Textile and apparel detention policy changed.
December 3, 2007... U.S. Customs and Border Protection issued a memorandum to its field offices, that modifies the agency's detention and penalty policy for certain textile and apparel shipments. This memo provides that while shipments identified based on the...

Best export opportunities.
December 3, 2007... Each year the Official Export Guide, a sister publication of Florida Shipper, publishes a nation-by-nation directory of the most current information about export opportunities. Here is a selection of the opportunities for key Florida...

Transport systems market surpasses $1 billion.
December 3, 2007... The global market for transportation management systems surpassed $1 billion for the first time in 2006, and will grow by at least 7 percent this year, according to a new study by ARC Advisory Group. Adrian Gonzalez, director of ARC's...

Port Georgialina deal advances.
December 3, 2007... The South Carolina and Georgia port authorities will jointly invest $7 million to buy 1,400 acres of land for a new container port in Jasper County, S.C. Gov. Mark Sanford of South Carolina and Gov. Sonny Perdue of Georgia also said the...

Report pushes transportation plan.
December 3, 2007... Two longtime intermodal transportation specialists said one way to break a political logjam on national transportation policy would be to create a blue-ribbon commission similar to the one that provided Congress with political cover to close...

UPS backs increase in infrastructure user fees.
December 3, 2007... UPS is willing to pay higher user fees to fund infrastructure improvements, provided the money is spent for its intended purpose, said Kurt Kuehne, the company's senior vice president of worldwide sales and marketing. "The bottom line is,...

Holidays bring air baggage limits.
December 3, 2007... Over the holidays when southbound passenger flights from Miami International Airport become holiday cargo hauls, American Airlines and its Eagle subsidiary are saying "no" to shoppers from Latin America and the Caribbean, limiting the size and...

Key congressman wavers on scanning.
December 3, 2007... House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., told a meeting of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce recently that he is open to the possibility of delaying a congressional mandate requiring all cargo containers to be scanned at...

Seafreight begins new service.
December 3, 2007... Seafreight Line Ltd. announced commencement of weekly, fixed-day service to Manzanillo International Terminal, Panama, and Cap-Haitien, Haiti. The new service began with first vessel calls on Tuesday, Oct. 30, and Thursday, Nov. 1, with...

Horizon Lines trims guidance.
December 3, 2007... Horizon Lines, the largest Jones Act ocean carrier, on Nov. 19 revised downward its profit projections for the fourth quarter and full-year 2007. The Charlotte, N.C.-based company now expects fourth-quarter operating revenue of $310...

Intermodal falls below 2006 volume.
December 3, 2007... BYLINE: John D. Boyd This was supposed to be a time of easy growth for the intermodal industry, a point when traffic would surge over the late-2006 softness. Instead, railroad hauls of trailers and containers keep declining, and leave...

Tampa Port Authority adds commissioner, client.
December 3, 2007... The Tampa Port Authority Board of Commissioners witnessed the swearing-in of Brian Blair at its November board meeting. The Hillsborough County Board of County Commissioners voted on Nov. 8 for Blair to represent the BOCC on the port authority...

Manatee adds salty tenant.
December 3, 2007... Port Manatee has added a salt distributor distribution center adjacent to Port Manatee to its diversified list of clients. The distribution center will be located at the former Piney Point phosphate plant site. International Salt plans to...

UPS, FedEx announce rate increases for 2008.
December 3, 2007... UPS and FedEx are planning their biggest rate increases in years. The two carriers will raise list prices on air and express shipments and international deliveries originating in the U.S. by 6.9 percent, but fuel surcharges on the services will...

Seek hard data.
December 17, 2007... I was rooting around in the archives of the articles published in The Journal of Commerce and its Shipper Group magazines looking for an item about Michael Andrews, the chief economist at PIERS, a sister company of Florida Shipper. Andrews...

Head Winds.
December 17, 2007... BYLINE: Rosalind McLymont Free trade faces challenges in 2008 In the middle of November, U.S. Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez led a bipartisan congressional delegation to Colombia to show the lawmakers how much Columbia has done to...

2008 shapes up as challenging year for global supply chains.
December 17, 2007... BYLINE: Bernie Hart When considering the global trade environment in 2008, there are a number potential issues looming that can disrupt global supply chains, sourcing strategies and the flow of working capital. If not properly addressed,...

Intermodal may rebound after slowdown.
December 17, 2007... BYLINE: John Boyd This was supposed to be a time of easy growth for the intermodal industry, a point when traffic would surge over the late-2006 softness. Instead, railroad hauls of trailers or containers keep falling and leave analysts...

Modest gains seen for cargo in 2008.
December 17, 2007... BYLINE: Nicole Nelson With air-cargo statistics for the first half of 2007 posting 5 percent volume gains over 2006 totals, the slightly below average yet far from disastrous growth is expected to trickle into the new year. A number of...

Construction slump likely to continue.
December 17, 2007... Carriers building their recovery hopes on a rebound in the construction industry next year should think again. A key construction industry forecast projects a 2 percent decline in construction spending next year after an 8 percent drop this...

US economy grows 4.9 percent.
December 17, 2007... Amid predictions of decline and even recession, when the revised third-quarter real gross domestic product report was released on Dec. 3, it showed that the U.S. economy grew 4.9 percent in the quarter -- the highest rate of GDP growth in four...

New document requirements to begin in 2008.
December 17, 2007... The U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the U.S. Department of State are reminding the traveling public that as of Jan. 31, 2008, all adult travelers will be required to present proof of citizenship and proof of identity when entering the...

China's sixth riot squad arrives in Haiti.
December 17, 2007... The official Chinese news agency reported that the sixth riot squad that China has sent to Haiti arrived recently at its base in Port-au-Prince, capital of the Caribbean country. The 125-member riot police have received four-month training in...

Antillean Marine expands to Port Everglades.
December 17, 2007... Antillean Marine Shipping Corp. announced an expansion of service to accommodate the recent success of its new liner service to Manzanillo, Panama, in addition to its Caribbean ports of call. According to a company press release, "Demand...

Babcock & Brown acquires ICS at Jaxport.
December 17, 2007... The global investment firm Babcock & Brown has acquired Jacksonville, Fla.-based ICS, a provider of perishable and dry warehouse services, as well as stevedoring and transportation services at the ports of Jacksonville, Mobile and New Orleans....

Mineta calls for sweeping maritime changes.
December 17, 2007... Former Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta recently called for consolidation of all U.S. government maritime agencies and functions into a single agency with a dedicated recurring funding source and a West Point style service academy at...

Jaxport earns 'A' from Wall Street.
December 17, 2007... Fitch Ratings and Moody's Investors Services have awarded the financial foundations of the Jacksonville Port Authority "A" and "A2" designations -- among the financial industry's highest seaport ratings. The agencies based their findings...

Melons arrive at Tampa.
December 17, 2007... The tropical melon season began at the Port of Tampa when the Sierra Lara brought a shipment of cantaloupes and honeydew melons imported by Altobaso USA from Guatemala. They were part of a weekly service operated by Norwegian-based Green...

Commerce launches textile and apparel Web resource.
December 17, 2007... Deputy Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Textiles and Apparel Matt Priest announced the launch of a new Web site to provide textile and apparel manufacturers in the U.S. a simpler way to access information regarding the Berry Amendment, a...

Find me a slum.
December 24, 2007... By the time you read this, Miami-Dade County commissioners will have decided if they can find a slum on Watson Island across Government Cut from the Port of Miami. If they can, it is win-win for the prosperous residents of Miami and for...

What time is it?
December 24, 2007... Time to become a Florida shipper The decline in the value of the U.S. dollar at the same time as the economies of Europe, Central America, South America and the Caribbean are enjoying robust growth provides an opportunity for those Florida...

Port of Miami, a stool in the making.
December 24, 2007... Miami port Director Bill Johnson, who repeats often that he is not a maritime expert, speaks just as often of a three-legged stool. One leg is a dredging program to deepen the port's ship channel to 52 feet in time for the expansion of the...

Tampa, Port Everglades plot billion-dollar futures.
December 24, 2007... Everywhere you look in Florida these days, the talk around the ports is about money earned or money needed. The Port of Tampa should spend as much as $1.5 billion over the next 20 years to ensure that it keeps up with competition in the...

Feds clear 100 containers full of smuggled goods.
December 24, 2007... Federal authorities said they have broken up a 10-person global crime ring in Newark, N.J., that smuggled 100 containers filled with millions of dollars worth of counterfeit consumer goods into the northeast. Federal agents said 10 people...

California goes for cold ironing for six ports.
December 24, 2007... The California Air Resources Board has approved a regulation requiring vessel operators whose container, reefer or passenger fleets make at least 25 annual visits to six California ports to start using shore power rather than onboard diesel...

US keeps rules on truckers' hours.
December 24, 2007... The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration is keeping the 11-hour daily driving limit for truck drivers on the books. In an interim final rule released Dec. 11, the agency kept the 11-hour driving limit and the 34-hour restart...

ITA's apparel and textile office to visit Colombia.
December 24, 2007... The International Trade Administration recently announced that representatives from its Office of Textiles and Apparel plan to be in Colombia during the week of Jan. 21. The ITA said the tour is designed to promote textile and apparel trade...

Hamburg Sud buys Costa Lines.
December 24, 2007... Hamburg Sud has purchased Costa Container Lines, which is the smaller partner of GF Group, the company announced. The deal, effective Dec. 1, also includes the operations of Calmedia Agenzia. Costa Container Lines generated more than $640...

WTO rules EU banana tariffs illegal.
December 24, 2007... The European Union has failed in its attempts to align import tariffs for bananas with international trade rules, a WTO compliance panel ruled on Dec. 10. Officials said the result could be millions of dollars in commercial sanctions from...

Canada to aid its textile industries.
December 24, 2007... Canada's Department of Finance recently published a notice announcing its intent to implement an initiative that will encourage the use of Canadian textiles in the manufacture of apparel in developing countries. This initiative is part of a...

Five Central American nations form Customs union.
December 24, 2007... Representatives of Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua and Costa Rica have agreed on the rules to begin formation of the Central American Customs Union at the 31st meeting of the Central American Integration System. The Customs...

Results of US-China trade meeting.
December 24, 2007... The U.S. and China signed a number of bilateral agreements on Dec. 11 during a one-day meeting of the Joint Commission on Commerce and Trade in Beijing. Highlights of these agreements, as prepared by the trade experts at Sandler & Travis...

MOL cuts more capacity to US East Coast.
December 24, 2007... Japanese carrier MOL on Dec. 10 announced additional winter capacity plans for the trade between Asia and the U.S. East Coast via the Panama Canal. In late November, MOL said it would withdraw more capacity to the U.S. West Coast, and...

IATA revises forecast downward.
December 24, 2007... The International Air Transport Association has revised its industry financial forecast. It now estimates a global industry profit of $5.6 billion in 2007 falling to $5 billion in 2008. The spike in fuel prices is expected to add $14...

Cash and prayers for Seafarers.
December 24, 2007... During the holiday season, Father Thomas Falkenthal, the chaplain of the Seafarers' House at Port Everglades suggests that those of us who derive our living from maritime commerce try to imagine ourselves in this scenario: "You're from a...

Horizon delivers holiday cheer.
December 24, 2007... Employees of Horizon Lines of Puerto Rico, a subsidiary of Horizon Lines Inc., celebrated the holidays by bringing gifts, snacks and holiday spirit to schoolchildren of La Esperanza School at its annual Christmas party. La Esperanza School...

Ready. Fire. Aim!
December 31, 2007... Members of the National Customs Brokers and Forwarders Association have mounted a grassroots effort to eliminate language in an import safety bill that would revoke brokers' licenses for bringing unsafe products into the United States. ...

New Year's Resolution.
December 31, 2007... BYLINE: Rosalind McLymont In March, ITT Corp. became the first major defense contractor convicted of a criminal violation of the Arms Export Control Act. ITT agreed to pay a $100 million penalty, one of the largest ever paid in a criminal...

SAP program helps with European eCustoms.
December 31, 2007... SAP AG has begun marketing new software to help companies comply with European electronic customs procedures. According to the company, the new software "facilitates electronic communication with modernized customs systems being...

Compliance: A customs conundrum.
December 31, 2007... BYLINE: Susan Kohn Ross It is impossible to read the trade press, and sometimes even the general press, without thinking, where is that company's compliance program? In no particular order of significance, but certainly getting many...

Remember the pioneers.
December 31, 2007... BYLINE: Araceli Wright and Rafael Puga Eight years ago, the Florida Foreign Trade Association created the International Trade Pioneers Program to recognize those individuals who broke ground for our industry's growth in South Florida,...

Banco del Sur founded.
December 31, 2007... Banco del Sur -- Hugo Chavez's Bank of the South -- was created on Dec. 9 to bankroll development in Latin America beyond the influence of the U.S. and its World Bank and International Development Bank appendages. Chavez has articulated...

Jaxport stevedore sold.
December 31, 2007... Australian investment firm Babcock & Brown, a principal in the construction of the proposed Port of Miami tunnels, has acquired ICS Logistics, a provider of perishable and dry warehouse services, and stevedoring and transportation services at...

Miami port tunnels one vote away.
December 31, 2007... Funding for the Miami port tunnels project to connect the port to Watson Island and its McArthur Causeway is one vote away from approval following a "conceptual vote" of approval by the Miami-Dade County commission on Dec. 18. The...

Cariforum and EU reach agreement.
December 31, 2007... An economic partnership agreement has been completed between the European Union and 15 Caribbean nations, including the Bahamas, which comprise Cariforum. The negotiations began three years ago and reached a zenith on Dec. 16 in Barbados,...

Grand Bahama container port gets hot.
December 31, 2007... Concerned about its substantial investment on the threshold of further spending, Hutchison Whampoa, owner of the container terminal at Freeport, Bahamas, used the occasion of its recent groundbreaking for the Freeport Container Port's Phase 4...

US sets quota levels for Haiti HOPE imports.
December 31, 2007... Haiti will be permitted to export to the U.S. up to 313 million-square-meter equivalent units of finished apparel products by Dec. 19, 2008, far more than this year's production. The quota was set under the Haitian Hemispheric Opportunity...

Trans-Atlantic air rates rise.
December 31, 2007... Airfreight pricing for imports into the U.S. from Europe jumped 5.8 percent in October, belying trends in the economy and currency exchange rates, according to a monthly survey of international transport pricing. The monthly survey by Banc...

Look beyond transport costs.(Company overview)
December 31, 2007... BYLINE: Paul Page When Dayton Superior sought to straighten out a convoluted distribution system and rein in logistics spending, the construction materials shipper didn't even think about looking at transportation costs until it took a...

Are intermediaries liable?
December 31, 2007... BYLINE: William Hoffman  U.S. investigation highlights questions for shippers, logistics providers in facing corrupt practices in global markets A Justice Department investigation of companies alleged to have passed bribes to...

US is still the word's largest manufacturer.
December 31, 2007... BYLINE: Alan M. Field Almost universally, politicians and pundits agree that U.S. manufacturing has been decimated by competition from foreigners who take advantage of lower wages and, in the case of China, unreasonably cheap foreign...

Tariffs hamper US exports.
December 31, 2007... Power Curbers Inc.'s exports have doubled over the past three years, but its foreign sales would be even higher if developing countries lowered their import tariffs, said Dyke Messenger, president of the Salisbury, N.C.-based manufacturer of...