Trade and Compliance

FreightWaves Classics/ Infrastructure: Blue Water Bridge is a key US-Canada crossing

The Blue Water Bridge. (Photo: ontbluecoast.com)

A major international crossing over the St. Clair River at the southern end of Lake Huron, Blue Water Bridge is located between Port Huron, Michigan and Point Edward, Ontario. When it fully opened to traffic during the fall of 1938, it became one of the fastest links between the Midwest and Ontario as well as the Northeast United States.

The (original) Blue Water Bridge is a cantilever truss bridge. Its total length is 6,178 feet; its main span is 871 feet long. The bridge was built as a joint...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/freightwaves-classicsinfrastructure-blue-water-bridge-is-a-key-us-canada-crossing

A potential economic recession and the supply chain bullwhip are colliding

Shipping freight container

Subtext: Supply chains are experiencing a massive bullwhip from the COVID economy and have built up massive inventory levels. A slowdown in consumer spending caused by inflation and a potential recession will have a massive impact on freight demand and prolong an inventory drawdown. 

As we look at the pandemic through the rearview mirror, the economy is shifting to a new phase. While the United States is currently experiencing full employment, American consumers are incredibly stressed about the...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/a-potential-economic-recession-and-the-supply-chain-bullwhip-are-colliding

Bubs baby formula from Australia gets FDA import approval

Twin babies on their back being fed from bottles.

The Biden administration on Friday took two more actions aimed at alleviating a critical domestic shortage of baby formula.

The Food and Drug Administration gave the green light to an Australian company to import its baby formula after relaxing strict regulatory requirements aimed at alleviating a critical domestic shortage. Also, Xavier Becerra, the Health and Human Services secretary, invoked the Defense Production Act for the third time in less than a week to help Cargill deliver raw...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/bubs-baby-formula-from-australia-gets-fda-import-approval

FDA authorizes more baby formula imports as air cargo pipeline grows

A large, white FedEx plane with blue tail rolls down the runway, heading toward camera.

The Food and Drug Administration on Thursday announced that an emergency shipment of baby formula equivalent to 5 million 8-ounce bottles — more than triple the amount delivered this week on the first two Operation Fly Formula flights — is being readied in Europe. 

The news follows completion of a FedEx delivery for the government, the FDA informing a second foreign manufacturer it could also use new regulatory flexibility to import infant formula and lawmakers seeking answers on how to...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/fda-authorizes-more-baby-formula-imports-as-air-cargo-pipeline-grows

Supply chains are never returning to ‘normal’

container terminal

The conventional wisdom at this time is that most of the world has moved on from the pandemic (except for China); therefore, supply chains will return to “normal.” Unfortunately, this is not the case. The world has permanently changed and supply chains are going to face continuing challenges for decades to come. Among those challenges are:

  • Supply chains will remain under constant threat of disruption for the next decade 
  • Supply chains operate best when the world is peaceful and stable 
  • A...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/supply-chains-are-never-returning-to-normal

Free trade is dead, welcome to ‘Freedom Trade’ 

Image of U.S. and Chinese flags, with a rupture between them indicating conflict.

American enterprises and consumers should move away from Chinese dependency and demand that supply chains are orientated toward what I call the “Freedom Trade,” a system built on the idea that the rule of law, domestic free markets, human rights, and environmental standards are necessary for global prosperity and peace. 

Supply chains operate best when there is predictability and peace – and the only way to guarantee this is to ensure that countries operate within the Freedom Trade system.  

Suppl...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/free-trade-is-dead-welcome-to-freedom-trade

Chinese lockdowns will create shocks to American supply chains (but China is the biggest loser)

Shanghai's zero-COVID lockdown continues.

What happens in China doesn’t stay in China. And for American supply chains, that is usually a good thing. American businesses have become dependent on low-cost goods coming from Chinese suppliers. But in a post-COVID world that may be entering the Second Cold War, reliance on China means that American businesses are held hostage by an autocratic regime that seems oblivious to the damage it is doing to its own economy, much less the global one. 

Since the earliest days of COVID-19, China has...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/chinese-lockdowns-will-create-shocks-to-american-supply-chains-but-china-is-the-biggest-loser

White House: Cross-border truck delays hammering supply chains

The White House is pressuring Texas Gov. Greg Abbott to lift added inspections of commercial trucks entering from Mexico as supply chain disruption at the border threatens to spin out of control.

White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki warned in a statement Wednesday that cross-border delays caused by the inspections — which Abbott said last week he was putting in place at major crossings to curb illegal immigration — “are causing significant disruptions to the food and automobile supply chains,...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/white-house-cross-border-truck-delays-hammering-supply-chains

FreightWaves Classics/Infrastructure: US transferred police powers in Panama Canal Zone 40 years ago

A ship in the canal. (Photo: Panama Canal Authority)

The two Torrijos-Carter Treaties are treaties signed by the United States and Panama in Washington, D.C. on September 7, 1977. The 1977 treaties superseded the Hay-Bunau-Varilla Treaty of 1903. The 1977 treaties guaranteed that Panama would gain control of the Panama Canal and the Panama Canal Zone on December 31, 2000, ending the control of the canal that the U.S. had exercised since 1903. 

Between the signing of the treaties and the formal transfer of the Canal Zone, there were intermediate...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/freightwaves-classicsinfrastructure-us-transferred-police-powers-in-panama-canal-zone-40-years-ago

UK, US kill merger between port crane makers Cargotec and Konecranes

A giant blue crane straddles rail tracks with intermodal container trains. at the Port of Savannah. Konecranes makes the equipment and just abandoned its merger with Cargotec because it couldn't get regulatory approval.

Cargotec and Konecranes, two of the largest global manufacturers of shipyard and container handling cranes for ports, announced Tuesday they are abandoning their planned merger after U.K. antitrust regulators blocked the transaction and the U.S. threatened legal action.

The two Finnish companies agreed in October on a $5 billion deal to create a combined material handling group.

The U.K. Competition & Markets Authority said it blocked the deal because proposed remedies to remove all overlapping...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/uk-us-kill-merger-between-port-crane-makers-cargotec-and-konecranes

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