The article California port congestion written by Matt Leonard for supplychaindive, was an interesting and informative piece. That discussed how Covid-19 has caused a massive increase of imported goods along with a decrease in the port’s workforce. Which in return has caused disaster to strike against the ports ability to unload cargo at the necessary rate of demand, with this happening it has caused a major back up of ships waiting in the bay to dock at the ports.
Container ships waiting to dock in California bay (Bonney, 19 container ships anchored off LA-Long BEACH PORTS)
What caused the congestion in the first place?
The spike in imports is unprecedented in scale, breaking new records on a monthly basis”
As stated in Matt Leonard’s article, with these record high imports the ports are not able to to keep up with the flow of new ships coming to port. Not only are there more ships than ever the ports are still being help to limited capacity due to Covid restrictions, which doesn’t help their chances of catching back up with the demand they are facing. The high level of imports are a direct result from consumers increased spending and retailers trying to restock their shelves with products. The shift from service based goods such as restaurants and Movie theaters due to lockdowns and Covid restrictions has turned consumers to spending on more physical goods along the lines of clothing, home decor, and electronics.
How to correct this issue.
In an attached article Congestion could clog California ports into February stating that there are 35 ships anchored along the California coast awaiting berthing spots. The shipping company Hapag-lloyd is estimating that the congestion of the West Coast ports will continue into the summer of 2021. Officials in Los Angeles said that they plan to start diverting ships that are backlogged to other ports on the West Coast that have available capacity like Seattle, Tacoma, and Washington as said in a Bloomberg Article. I do feel that diverting some of the smaller waiting cargo ships to other West Coast ports is a viable option that could help in the short term until things get back to normal. The cost of moving up the coast to another port outweighs the costs of sitting still in the bay for days on end not unloading any of the cargo losing money each and everyday.
Personal thoughts on the supply chain issue.
Since the supply chain industry has never faced so many disrupting factors before I can understand why there was no plan of action that could of prepared companies and the world for what was to come with this Pandemic. In the panic of the start of Covid consumers were buying in bulk and hoarding supplies in the wake of the pending lockdowns, which left shelf bare and companies in a scramble to fill the shelfs again. For future planning I think that we should incorporate a new system to handle any overflow of container ships so that a clog up of ships like this never happens again. Meaning that as a country we should start using less popular ports more to take some of the strain off of the major ports in California, along with utilizing smaller vessels to use the Panama Canal to reach ports in places like the Gulf of Mexico to also delegate some of the shipping traffic. With the return of more laborers to the ports with the easing of Covid restrictions, will allow more workers to return to work to unload ships and get the cargo containers loaded onto trucks, this will undoubtingly help start to move things along more effectively.
Closing thoughts.
To sum up everything that has been stated so far, the major congestion in our West Coast ports is a serious supply chain issue that needs to be corrected as soon as possible. Along with planning for new ways to handle future demand spikes like we have seen in the previous months. I do believe as the Covid restrictions start to fade away that the consumer spending habits will slowly move back to the normal flow and help lighten demand of products, and with the demand decreasing it will allow for the ports to catch up with the backlogged demand.