One of the largest ports in the country is seeing major improvements in shipping congestion, according to the port’s executive director and chief operating officer.
Noel Hacegaba, who oversees the Port of Long Beach in California, spoke yesterday during a webinar hosted by the Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce’s World Trade Association.
He said no ships are currently at anchor at the port, which he said is “a far cry” from earlier this year when 109 ships were held up there in January.
“Things are a lot better than they were just a few months ago, but we’re not completely out of the woods … We still have more containers on terminal than we’re accustomed to,” he said. “Things are moving, but not as fast as we would like, especially on the rail side.”
The San Pedro Bay Port Complex — which includes both the Port of Long Beach and the Port of Los Angeles — accounts for about 40 percent of all container cargo entering the United States each year, Hacegaba explained.
He discussed some of the factors that contributed to supply chain disruptions, including historically high demand for imports, the rise in e-commerce, a shortage of truck drivers and more.
“With containers piling up at the terminals, because our warehouses were too full, that basically rendered the ships at anchor as warehouses on water,” he said. “And that’s the reason we had so many ships at anchor at that time.”
With international supply chains seeing more movement this year, Hacegaba said “there’s a good chance” the port will set a new record for cargo volume for 2022. But he added “it’s not going to be anywhere close to what folks were forecasting and projecting late last year or early this year” as some supply chain troubles persist.
