Maritime
February 1: Suez Canal Authority Says Stability Returning to Red Sea – gCaptain
Suez Canal Authority Chairman Osama Rabie has told shipping giant AP Moller-Maersk there are signs of stability returning to the Red Sea, and urged the company to take that into account when planning sea routes, according to a statement from the SCA.
“We seek to take into account the positive indicators observed in the Red Sea region when planning maritime schedules in the coming period,” Rabie was quoted as saying.
Several major global shipping companies have suspended Red Sea voyages and rerouted vessels around southern Africa to avoid potential attacks from Yemen’s Houthis.
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said in December the disruption had cost Egypt around $7 billion in revenues from the Suez Canal in 2024.
February 2: Rubio Calls ‘Status Quo’ at Panama Canal Unacceptable, as Trump Renews Vow to Seize It – The Wall Street Journal on MSN
Secretary of State Marco Rubio arrived on February 2 with an ultimatum from the White House for Panamanian President José Raúl Mulino: Either curtail China’s presence around the Panama Canal or face an unspecified U.S. response.
On his first overseas stop since taking office, Rubio toured the canal after talks at the country’s presidential palace with Mulino, who has rejected President Trump’s threats to take back the waterway as an affront to Panama’s sovereignty.
In a significant concession, Mulino afterward declared Panama wouldn’t be renewing a 2017 infrastructure funding agreement with Beijing and offered “technical-level” talks to clarify Trump’s doubts about Chinese control of the canal. He called the meeting with Rubio “positive” and said he didn’t think Trump’s threats would continue.
But even before Rubio departed the country, Trump appeared to double down on his threats to seize the canal, which the U.S. relinquished to Panama in 1999. “We’re taking it back, or something very powerful is going to happen,” he said, speaking to reporters at Joint Base Andrews outside Washington.
February 4: Panama Court Is Asked to Cancel Hong Kong Firm’s Contract to Run Canal Ports – The Guardian
Two Panamanian lawyers have lodged a lawsuit with the country’s supreme court in an attempt to cancel a Hong Kong-based company’s concession to operate two ports at either end of the Panama canal. Their complaint – filed a day after the U.S. secretary of state, Marco Rubio, told Panama’s president, José Raúl Mulino, to reduce China’s alleged influence on the canal – argues that the contract for the two ports is unconstitutional.
If the case is admitted by the court – and the argument is accepted – it could lead to the swift revocation of the contracts, and a victory for Donald Trump’s campaign to push back against Beijing’s presence in the Central American country.
A subsidiary of CK Hutchison Holdings, owned by the Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing, has operated two of the canal’s five ports since it won the tender in 1997.
“After a detailed analysis of the contract … we decided that an action for unconstitutionality was the appropriate means” to challenge the concession, said Julio Macías, one of the lawyers behind the suit.
Panama’s government is anxious to avoid a scenario in which the U.S. takes the canal by force – or obliges them to meaningfully change the fee structures that are applied equally to ships of all countries and based on market conditions.
February 10: ILA Wage Scale Committee Signs Off on Tentative ILA-USMX Deal Ahead of Ratification Vote – Logistics Management
Ahead of a ratification vote on a new master contract set to take place on February 25, the International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA) said late last week that its Wage Scale Committee unanimously approved the tentative agreement between the ILA and the United States Maritime Alliance (USMX) that was struck in early January.
“I believe our work here today moves us to the ratification vote on Tuesday, February 25, 2025, when ILA rank-and-file members will vote on what I believe is the greatest ILA contract, and the greatest contract negotiated by a labour organization,” said ILA President Harold J. Daggett. “Our collective strength helped produce the richest contact in our history.”
ILA officials said that the new contract and its benefits are retroactive to October 1, 2024, and, if ratified by ILA members, will stay in effect until September 30, 2030. And they added that ILA rank-and-file members will receive details of the contract (which are not being made public) approved by the ILA Wage Scale Committee at local meetings over the next two weeks, leading up to the February 25 ratification vote date.
February 11: HMM, ONE, Yang Ming Alliance Now Effective, FMC Says – Supply Chain Dive
HMM, Ocean Network Express – known as ONE – and Yang Ming Marine Transport’s Premier Alliance took effect on February 9, the U.S. Federal Maritime Commission said in a press release last week. The alliance will be in effect for five years.
The alliance was originally slated to go into effect on December 12, 2024, but the FMC halted implementation on December 6 after determining the operational agreement lacked details about its potential competitive impacts.
HMM, ONE and Yang Ming complied with the agency’s request to deliver additional documentation clarifying matters not addressed in the original agreement, according to the release.
“The information provided by the Premier Alliance Agreement was deemed by the Commission as responsive on December 26, 2024,” the FMC said in the release.
February 23: U.S. Targets China Ships, Operators with Millions of Dollars in New Port Charges – American Shipper
In a major retaliatory move against China, the United States is proposing expensive charges that could add millions of dollars in costs for ocean container lines and other carriers calling U.S. ports.
The proposal by the office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR), published on February 21 in the Federal Register, sets fees as high as $1.5 million per U.S. port call for ships built in China and $500,000 for a vessel operator with even a single Chinese-built ship in its fleet, or on order with a China shipyard.
The plan will send tremors through the maritime supply chain serving the world’s largest market, where major ocean carriers operate in a complex network of cooperation ranging from service routes to berthing arrangements and sharing of vessels. Carriers will likely pass on the expensive new fees to shippers in the form of surcharges and higher rates, who in turn will pass them on as higher prices for imported goods.
February 26: ILA Ratifies 6-Year Labour Contract – Supply Chain Dive
The International Longshoremen’s Association voted to ratify a six-year contract agreement with the United States Maritime Alliance on February 25, according to a Facebook post shared by the union.
The union, which represents roughly 85,000 longshore workers at 100 seaports across the East and Gulf Coasts, said its members voted nearly 99% in favour to approve the tentative contract agreement that was reached in January.
The ILA said in a statement the contract became retroactively effective on October 1, 2024 and will expire on September 30, 2030. The contract will be formally signed by both the ILA and USMX on March 11.
February 27: Panama’s Attorney-General Backs Claims to Cancel Hutchison Port Concessions – Seatrade Maritime
The port concessions held by Hutchison Ports subsidiary Panama Ports Company (PPC) in Balboa and Cristobal on the Pacific and Atlantic entrances of the Panama Canal have been in the spotlight as part of claims by U.S. President Donald Trump that the waterway is under Chinese control.
With parent company CK Hutchison headquartered in the Chinese Special Administrative Region of Hong Kong, the Trump administration believes that in a time of conflict the Chinese government could order the port operator to block access to the Canal.
The 25-year concession to Hutchison’s PPC was granted in 1997 and extended for a further 25-years in 2021.
In early February, two Panamanian lawyers filed a complaint with the country’s Supreme Court to nullify the concessions on the basis that they were unconstitutional.
On February 19, Attorney General of Panama Luis Carlos Gómez sent his opinion to the presiding judge of the Supreme Court of Justice, María Eugenia López Arias, concluding the concession was “unconstitutional.”
February 28: U.S. Port Fees on China Vessels Would Affect All Shipping Firms, CMA CGM Says – gCaptain
U.S. proposals to hit Chinese vessels with high port fees would have a major impact on all firms in a container shipping industry in which most vessels are built in China, said French-based shipping firm CMA CGM.
The U.S. Trade Representative’s office has proposed charging up to $1.5 million for Chinese-built vessels entering U.S. ports as part of its investigation into China’s expansion in the shipbuilding, maritime and logistics sectors.
“China builds more than half of all container ships in the world, so this would have a significant effect on all shipping firms,” Chief Financial Officer Ramon Fernandez told reporters.
Air
February 4: Air Cargo Industry Jolted by Trump Tariffs on Chinese E-Commerce – FreightWaves
President Donald Trump’s weekend order eliminating a duty-free exemption for low-value e-commerce shipments from China could upend business models for many companies engaged in international trade, but stakeholders say the air cargo sector could take the biggest hit.
Chinese and U.S. marketplaces like Shein, Temu, AliExpress, Amazon and Shopify also could be significantly constrained in the short term.
The U.S. imported more than 2.5 million tons of cargo by air from China last year, including about 1.3 million tons of cheap e-commerce products that are potentially impacted by the U.S. decision to close the trade privilege as of this week. The rest is general cargo now subject to a new 10% tariff on Chinese goods, according to data from Netherlands-based air cargo consultancy Rotate.
Electronic retailers, logistics service providers, express carriers, customs brokers and others are scrambling to understand the new rules and how to reorient workstreams accordingly. Trade professionals say they are confused about how to adjust operations with only a vague announcement from the White House and few answers so far from U.S. Customs and Border Protection. The situation is still very fluid and projected impacts could change depending on whether President Trump changes his mind – as he did on February 3, giving Canada and Mexico a one-month reprieve on 25% tariffs – or the types of coping mechanisms companies identify.
Rail
February 5: CPKC, United Steelworkers Reach Tentative Agreement – Progressive Railroading
Canadian Pacific Kansas City announced on February 5 it has reached a tentative four-year collective agreement with United Steelworkers (USW), representing approximately 600 clerical and intermodal employees in Canada.
Details of the tentative collective agreement will not be released publicly until the agreement has been ratified.
The tentative agreement is the third CPKC has reached this year in Canada.
Trucking
February 4: Truckers Fear Job Losses if Tariffs Imposed – La Presse (translated from French)
Truckers fear that the 25% tariffs that U.S. President Donald Trump is still threatening to impose will have disastrous consequences for their sector, as trade between Canada and the United States would suffer.
“If these tariffs remain in place at these levels for an extended period of time, it could be the final nail in the coffin for many trucking fleets,” warned Canadian Trucking Alliance President Stephen Laskowski. “It’s a bleak picture.”
Tariffs on Canadian imports into the United States, which ultimately won’t take effect for at least 30 days, would be the biggest trade shock north of the border in nearly a century, according to RBC Economics.
Several of the 5,000 member companies of the Canadian Trucking Alliance are already struggling due to weaker consumer demand. “It’s a hypercompetitive situation,” Laskowski said of the struggling sector.
“When the economy catches a cold, the trucking industry catches pneumonia.”
Some 120,000 Canadian truckers haul cross-border shipments, he said. Shipments to the United States account for about two-thirds of all Canadian truckloads, according to transportation technology firm Arrive Logistics.
February 7: Trump Halts Program to Expand U.S. EV Charger Network – Transport Topics
The Trump administration is suspending federal funding for electric car chargers, following through on one of President Donald Trump’s first directives to roll back U.S. subsidies for plug-in vehicles after he retook the White House.
The U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Highway Administration announced in a letter dated February 6 that it is suspending approval of funds intended to be distributed to states from the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure Formula Program, which provides funding to add chargers mostly along the interstate highway system.
The NEVI program was included in the 2021 bipartisan infrastructure law that was passed by Congress under former President Joe Biden. It allocated $5 billion over five years to install chargers in an effort to jump-start acceptance of the plug-in cars.
Trump has made rescinding Biden’s pro-EV initiatives a key plank of his economic platform.
February 14: U.S. Feds Taking Another Look at Truck-Broker Contract Rules – FreightWaves
The Trump administration has given renewed hope to truck owner-operators that the government will make it easier for them to review broker transaction records to combat alleged price gouging and help ensure they get a fair price for hauling freight.
The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration is reopening the comment period for its “Transparency in Property Broker Transactions” notice of proposed rulemaking (NPRM) at the request of the Small Business in Transportation Coalition. The initial 60-day comment period, which ended on January 21, received close to 5,000 comments.
SBTC petitioned FMCSA on January 19 for an additional 14 to 30 days based on the high number of comments coming in at deadline, and to give drivers affected or displaced by the wildfires in Southern California an opportunity to respond to the proposed rule.
The new comment period ends on March 20.
February 25: Cargo Theft Surges in Canada, U.S., with More Than 13,500 Incidents Recorded in 2024 – Today’s Trucking
Cargo theft remains a growing concern in Canada, with Ontario accounting for 85% of all reported incidents in 2024, according to Overhaul’s newly released annual cargo theft report, that summarizes and analyzes theft data collected in 2024 across Canada and the U.S.
The Greater Toronto Area (GTA) remains the country’s biggest hotspot, while the remaining 15% of thefts were spread across British Columbia (5%), Saskatchewan (4%), Alberta (3%), Quebec (1%), New Brunswick (1%) and Newfoundland (1%).
Despite being historically underreported compared with the U.S., cargo theft in Canada is well known within the industry, and criminal networks mirror those in the U.S., using the same sophisticated methods to steal and distribute stolen goods. In September 2024, Mark Haywood, a detective with Peel Regional Police who runs the cargo side of its Commercial Auto Crime Bureau, said cargo theft in the Greater Toronto Area’s Peel Region has taken a disturbing turn, placing it third in North America for high cargo theft activity.
