Fraud steals into the food supply chain
Kraft Foods is just one of the higher-profile victims of a scheme to sell millions of pounds of moldy or otherwise defective tomato products. Federal prosecutors say more than 55 companies may have inadvertently moved the tainted shipments through supply chains and out to consumers, the New York Times reports. The culprits at SK Foods were able to move substandard tomato paste and puree by bribing purchasing managers (at Kraft, Frito-Lay, Safeway, and B&G Foods) and by falsifying the documentation on sales to other customers.
One commentator points out that, while product tainting is often associated with imports, this case was made entirely in the USA. The take-away is that supply chains need close monitoring, both to prevent distribution of bad product and to roll it up if reaches the market by accident or by criminal intent. When the supply chain crosses borders, The Datamyne can help: contact us to learn how.
Thursday, February 25, 2010
Thursday, February 18, 2010
Engine for growth
Betting that more exports = more jobs
The Obama administration’s National Export Initiative (NEI) aims to double U.S. exports over the next five years by expanding government promotion efforts. The ultimate goal is job creation. As the Economic Report of the President concludes: “If consumption and construction are not the drivers of growth going forward in the way they were in the early 2000s, two components of private demand are left to fill the gap: business investment excluding structures and net exports.” In 2008, exports represented the work of roughly 10 million American workers.
The NEI calls for an additional $132 million for the Commerce Department’s International Trade Administration (ITA), and the Department of Agriculture to educate farmers and businesses about opportunities overseas and directly connect them with new customers. The NEI also seeks improved access to credit, especially for small- and medium-sized businesses, and increased government focus on knocking down barriers that keep U.S. companies from foreign markets. (Read more details here.)
Of course, you don’t have to wait for Congress to approve a bigger budget for the ITA, you can identify overseas business opportunities today with The Datamyne’s commercial intelligence: contact us to learn more.
The Obama administration’s National Export Initiative (NEI) aims to double U.S. exports over the next five years by expanding government promotion efforts. The ultimate goal is job creation. As the Economic Report of the President concludes: “If consumption and construction are not the drivers of growth going forward in the way they were in the early 2000s, two components of private demand are left to fill the gap: business investment excluding structures and net exports.” In 2008, exports represented the work of roughly 10 million American workers.
The NEI calls for an additional $132 million for the Commerce Department’s International Trade Administration (ITA), and the Department of Agriculture to educate farmers and businesses about opportunities overseas and directly connect them with new customers. The NEI also seeks improved access to credit, especially for small- and medium-sized businesses, and increased government focus on knocking down barriers that keep U.S. companies from foreign markets. (Read more details here.)
Of course, you don’t have to wait for Congress to approve a bigger budget for the ITA, you can identify overseas business opportunities today with The Datamyne’s commercial intelligence: contact us to learn more.
Cloudy with a chance of …
Trade outlook depends on the dollar’s rise and fall
Back from a three-day weekend you might have picked up a copy of the Wall Street Journal on Tuesday to find the U.S. dollar had strengthened relative to the euro, the result of a crisis of confidence in the European Union’s ability to cope with the struggling Greek economy. If, on the other hand, you read the Journal’s digital edition online with your morning coffee, you learned that the dollar’s surge had snapped as investors pushed the euro to its biggest single-day gain since July.
No matter whose trade forecast(s) you follow, the biggest variable (barring catastrophe) is the rise and fall of the U.S. dollar — and that can turn on a dime.
You can follow the dollar’s fortunes online with ICE U.S. Dollar Index (USDX), a leading benchmark for the international value of the U.S. dollar since its origination by the New York Board of Trade, or NYBOT. (The ICE, or Intercontinental Exchange, acquired NYBOT in 2007.) The ICE USDX Futures line graph captures the dollar’s fluctuations intraday or, over the last 3 months, year, or 2 years. The dollar-tracker at INO.com offers a bit more detail, and a few more choices of short timeframes. To monitor trends and calculate the value of your dollars against 164 currencies and 3 metals, try the Oanda currency converter.
Back from a three-day weekend you might have picked up a copy of the Wall Street Journal on Tuesday to find the U.S. dollar had strengthened relative to the euro, the result of a crisis of confidence in the European Union’s ability to cope with the struggling Greek economy. If, on the other hand, you read the Journal’s digital edition online with your morning coffee, you learned that the dollar’s surge had snapped as investors pushed the euro to its biggest single-day gain since July.
No matter whose trade forecast(s) you follow, the biggest variable (barring catastrophe) is the rise and fall of the U.S. dollar — and that can turn on a dime.
You can follow the dollar’s fortunes online with ICE U.S. Dollar Index (USDX), a leading benchmark for the international value of the U.S. dollar since its origination by the New York Board of Trade, or NYBOT. (The ICE, or Intercontinental Exchange, acquired NYBOT in 2007.) The ICE USDX Futures line graph captures the dollar’s fluctuations intraday or, over the last 3 months, year, or 2 years. The dollar-tracker at INO.com offers a bit more detail, and a few more choices of short timeframes. To monitor trends and calculate the value of your dollars against 164 currencies and 3 metals, try the Oanda currency converter.
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
The Datamyne Top 5
Top U.S. Export Markets
Top Countries of Destination
2009 - JAN to NOV - FOB Value US$
"We will double our exports over the Next five years..."Here's where we start:
– President Obama, SOTUS, January 27
Top Countries of Destination
2009 - JAN to NOV - FOB Value US$
The Big Squeeze
Coping with capacity shortages and rising rates
By Bill Armbruster
The Problems:
• Shippers are facing severe shortages of vessel capacity. Even some who have booked shipments weeks in advance and who are regular customers have had their containers “rolled” at the piers because container carriers are giving priority to bigger customers and/or those who are willing to pay more.
• Carriers are demanding – and getting – hundreds of dollars in rate increases, regardless of the rates they agreed to in contracts signed last year. Carriers in the trade from Asia to the U.S., for example, posted “emergency recovery charges” of up to $400 a box. Space was so tight in the weeks prior to Chinese New Year that some imposed an extra $200 a container just to guarantee that the shipment moved on the booked voyage.
• Besides the shortage of vessel space, there is also a shortage of containers. Carriers have slashed intermodal service so that shippers, particularly exporters in the U.S. interior, have to make their own arrangements with truckers or railroads to move their cargo to the port. This can cost upwards of $2,000.
The Cause:
In order to raise rates, carriers reduced the supply of capacity by laying up their own ships, returning chartered vessels to their owners, by slow steaming, by eliminating services, and through vessel-sharing agreements.
The Background:
Carriers’ bottom lines have taken a huge hit over the past few years. I see four reasons for their plight. The first two are their own fault.
• The Great Recession. With the biggest contraction in trade since World War II, cargo volumes tumbled in 2008 and 2009. The plunge in imports especially hurt the carriers’ bottom lines because their rates on finished goods, which dominate imports, are much higher than the low-value commodities such as waste paper, scrap metal and hay that dominate U.S. containerized exports.
• Billion-dollar buying binges. Carriers invested massive amounts of money on large new vessels – enough to double the capacity of the world container fleet by 2013.
• The race to the bottom. In a desperate bid to get whatever revenue they could, carriers slashed rates by hundreds of dollars a container – even when shippers didn’t ask them to do it.
• Bunker busters. Soaring oil prices, which topped off at $147 a barrel in mid-2007, sent bunker fuel costs so high that for a while they accounted for more than half of voyage operating costs.
What Shippers Can Do:
Unfortunately, the options are limited, given the carriers’ success in tilting the supply-and-demand equation in their favor. But here are some ideas:
• Plan ahead. Try to determine your future needs.
• Communicate those needs to your carriers.
• Book your cargo early – perhaps even four to six weeks in advance.
• Be flexible. For example, consider alternative ports even if the inland transportation will be more expensive.
• Work with your truckers, and perhaps with other shippers in your region. For example, if you’re an exporter based in the U.S interior, you may find a trucker who is delivering import containers to a site near your facility. Perhaps the trucker can deliver that container to your facility and then carry your cargo in that container back to the port. You may be able to split the extra cost for the inland move with an importer.
• Inform your customers that your shipment may be late reaching them. Also tell them that your transportation costs are rising, and that you may want them to share in that extra cost.
• Finally, be realistic. Accept that you are going to have to pay more and that you may have to face some delays.
About Bill Armbruster
Bill Armbruster, the anchor for The Datamyne Blog has covered shipping and trade for 30 years as a reporter and editor with The Journal of Commerce and Shipping Digest. “I’ll be blogging on headline news and current issues in oceangoing commerce, trying to shed some light on the backstories and, wherever I can, supply some sound advice for shippers.” Write to Bill@TheDatamyne.com
By Bill Armbruster
The Problems:
• Shippers are facing severe shortages of vessel capacity. Even some who have booked shipments weeks in advance and who are regular customers have had their containers “rolled” at the piers because container carriers are giving priority to bigger customers and/or those who are willing to pay more.
• Carriers are demanding – and getting – hundreds of dollars in rate increases, regardless of the rates they agreed to in contracts signed last year. Carriers in the trade from Asia to the U.S., for example, posted “emergency recovery charges” of up to $400 a box. Space was so tight in the weeks prior to Chinese New Year that some imposed an extra $200 a container just to guarantee that the shipment moved on the booked voyage.
• Besides the shortage of vessel space, there is also a shortage of containers. Carriers have slashed intermodal service so that shippers, particularly exporters in the U.S. interior, have to make their own arrangements with truckers or railroads to move their cargo to the port. This can cost upwards of $2,000.
The Cause:
In order to raise rates, carriers reduced the supply of capacity by laying up their own ships, returning chartered vessels to their owners, by slow steaming, by eliminating services, and through vessel-sharing agreements.
The Background:
Carriers’ bottom lines have taken a huge hit over the past few years. I see four reasons for their plight. The first two are their own fault.
• The Great Recession. With the biggest contraction in trade since World War II, cargo volumes tumbled in 2008 and 2009. The plunge in imports especially hurt the carriers’ bottom lines because their rates on finished goods, which dominate imports, are much higher than the low-value commodities such as waste paper, scrap metal and hay that dominate U.S. containerized exports.
• Billion-dollar buying binges. Carriers invested massive amounts of money on large new vessels – enough to double the capacity of the world container fleet by 2013.
• The race to the bottom. In a desperate bid to get whatever revenue they could, carriers slashed rates by hundreds of dollars a container – even when shippers didn’t ask them to do it.
• Bunker busters. Soaring oil prices, which topped off at $147 a barrel in mid-2007, sent bunker fuel costs so high that for a while they accounted for more than half of voyage operating costs.
What Shippers Can Do:
Unfortunately, the options are limited, given the carriers’ success in tilting the supply-and-demand equation in their favor. But here are some ideas:
• Plan ahead. Try to determine your future needs.
• Communicate those needs to your carriers.
• Book your cargo early – perhaps even four to six weeks in advance.
• Be flexible. For example, consider alternative ports even if the inland transportation will be more expensive.
• Work with your truckers, and perhaps with other shippers in your region. For example, if you’re an exporter based in the U.S interior, you may find a trucker who is delivering import containers to a site near your facility. Perhaps the trucker can deliver that container to your facility and then carry your cargo in that container back to the port. You may be able to split the extra cost for the inland move with an importer.
• Inform your customers that your shipment may be late reaching them. Also tell them that your transportation costs are rising, and that you may want them to share in that extra cost.
• Finally, be realistic. Accept that you are going to have to pay more and that you may have to face some delays.
About Bill Armbruster
Bill Armbruster, the anchor for The Datamyne Blog has covered shipping and trade for 30 years as a reporter and editor with The Journal of Commerce and Shipping Digest. “I’ll be blogging on headline news and current issues in oceangoing commerce, trying to shed some light on the backstories and, wherever I can, supply some sound advice for shippers.” Write to Bill@TheDatamyne.comAs Seen on TV
Who makes this stuff?
The Snuggie wearable blanket, the PedEgg foot callous file, TopsyTurvy upside down tomato planter — these and more solutions to problems you didn’t know you had until you saw the infomercial are brightening up an otherwise gloomy retail sector.
As reported in the Wall Street Journal (link here: subscription required), the recession has driven down traditional consumer companies’ advertising and the cost of television air time. As Seen on TV — or ASOT — marketers’ rushed in to fill the gap and found a newly cost-conscious audience eager to buy their low-priced merchandise. So successful are the ASOT pitches that the products are moving out of the ether and into bricks-and-mortar retail outlets near you, including Wal-Mart, Target, Bed Bath & Beyond, and Walgreens.
The WSJ focuses on the inventors of these thingamabobs and the marketers who recognize their telegenic potential. But who makes this stuff … and makes the discount price possible? As Telebrands founder A.J. Khubani recounts his pioneering success in the ’80s, he saw UV sunglasses advertised for $59.99, got in touch with his father’s Taiwan-based supplier who agreed to make them for $1.00, then sold them for $10.00.
Your dad doesn’t have offshore contacts? You can turn to The Datamyne. A quick search of The Datamyne bill of lading database found Asad International of Hong Kong (Loud ’n Clear personal amplifiers), China’s Longhai Jun-Yi Metal Co. (Perfect Brownie Pans), Ningbo Dongrun Leisure Products (TopsyTurvy planters), and many more manufacturers (as well as other ASOT marketers such as Ideavillage and Allstar Marketing). To learn more about using The Datamyne to find new sources or new customers, contact us.
The Snuggie wearable blanket, the PedEgg foot callous file, TopsyTurvy upside down tomato planter — these and more solutions to problems you didn’t know you had until you saw the infomercial are brightening up an otherwise gloomy retail sector.
As reported in the Wall Street Journal (link here: subscription required), the recession has driven down traditional consumer companies’ advertising and the cost of television air time. As Seen on TV — or ASOT — marketers’ rushed in to fill the gap and found a newly cost-conscious audience eager to buy their low-priced merchandise. So successful are the ASOT pitches that the products are moving out of the ether and into bricks-and-mortar retail outlets near you, including Wal-Mart, Target, Bed Bath & Beyond, and Walgreens.
The WSJ focuses on the inventors of these thingamabobs and the marketers who recognize their telegenic potential. But who makes this stuff … and makes the discount price possible? As Telebrands founder A.J. Khubani recounts his pioneering success in the ’80s, he saw UV sunglasses advertised for $59.99, got in touch with his father’s Taiwan-based supplier who agreed to make them for $1.00, then sold them for $10.00.
Your dad doesn’t have offshore contacts? You can turn to The Datamyne. A quick search of The Datamyne bill of lading database found Asad International of Hong Kong (Loud ’n Clear personal amplifiers), China’s Longhai Jun-Yi Metal Co. (Perfect Brownie Pans), Ningbo Dongrun Leisure Products (TopsyTurvy planters), and many more manufacturers (as well as other ASOT marketers such as Ideavillage and Allstar Marketing). To learn more about using The Datamyne to find new sources or new customers, contact us.
Trade Winds – The Americas
Still some room at the forum
One of the most important regions for U.S. exports is the Americas, market for more than $525 billion in U.S. merchandise in 2008. The Trade Winds Forum, to be held this year in São Paulo April 25-30, is the signature event of the U.S. and Foreign Commercial Service. The multi-sector trade mission is overbooked … HOWEVER, alternative programs taking place in São Paolo and Rio de Janeiro have been opened for companies in select industries, including architecture/construction/engineering and transportation. Click here to learn more.
One of the most important regions for U.S. exports is the Americas, market for more than $525 billion in U.S. merchandise in 2008. The Trade Winds Forum, to be held this year in São Paulo April 25-30, is the signature event of the U.S. and Foreign Commercial Service. The multi-sector trade mission is overbooked … HOWEVER, alternative programs taking place in São Paolo and Rio de Janeiro have been opened for companies in select industries, including architecture/construction/engineering and transportation. Click here to learn more.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)