“To reach a port, we must not drift or tie at anchor, but set sail,” said President Franklin Roosevelt.

He wasn’t speaking of the current logjam at ports like Los Angeles and Long Beach, but his quote remains accurate in today's environment --- cargo sitting idle in a port benefits no one --- especially so when it involves a perishable commodity like tree nuts harvested and ready for export.

Few can analyze the port tie-up like Michael Angell, Associate Editor of JOC, a container shipping and trade news publication.  “This is a major issue for California agricultural exporters, especially so when harvest is done and high-value product is ready to be shipped to major overseas markets.  Empty 40-foot ocean shipping containers awaiting a return trip to Asia or full ones just sitting idle accomplish little.”

It hasn’t always been like this.  “In previous years, prior to 2019, the cost of container shipping from the U.S. to Asia was roughly less than a thousand dollars,” he says. “It wasn’t something the container lines made money on, just essentially subsidizing the cost of their imports.  Today those empty containers are in high demand in Asia to load up more import goods and they are not as freely available to exporters.”

Many of the containers sitting in a container yard aren’t idle due to an admitted lack of destination drivers, but because of a lack of chassis that drivers use to pull the imports.  “We call it ‘street dwell’ for the chassis when it sits idle,” says Angell.

While containers of furniture or machine parts don’t deteriorate or rust away sitting without movement to their final destination, perishable commodities like tree nuts have a much shorter shelf life.

“Importers have already started to bring in their spring season merchandise, so it becomes a matter of commodity value shift based on demand and that means that, essentially, shipping rates are not going to go down.  Unfortunately that ties up both directions, eastbound to the U.S. and westbound from the U.S.

“There are a number of things being discussed involving growers and agricultural exporters in the Central Valley, like attempting to form their own chassis pool where production farmers would chip in and buy their own chassis.  There’s capital investment needed and it doesn’t solve the current problem, but it may help move product faster in the future.”

60-day delay

Asked if changing conditions and 24/7 efforts could clear up some of the backlog going forward in the new year, he said: “The backlog, meaning just the ships currently sitting outside the port (at the time of this interview, roughly 130 container ships sitting flat in the water), that backlog isn’t going to clear until sometime probably beyond March into April.  At a minimum, everyone is facing a 60-day delay in just landing the cargo in the first place, so the ports are dealing with loading incoming as well as dealing with a number of empty containers sitting idle, waiting to go back home, which is further congesting things.

“Of course, that doesn’t help growers any because the containers are not available for export — unless somebody wants to pay a hefty premium.”

Efforts are underway to utilize other West Coast ports.  “The Department of Transportation and the Secretary of Agriculture have issued a call to ocean carriers serving the U.S. to bring more service into Oakland, a major ag export port, as well as Portland.  Ports nearby to the Sacramento/Stockton tree orchard areas would be a natural for exporting out tree nuts.”