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Source: The Summerville Journal Scene
Brazil is set to overtake the U.S. as the biggest soybean exporter this year, according to data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.Rates for Panamax ships hauling cargoes from crops and coal rose the most in nearly six weeks as demand gained for grain and oilseeds from South America.
Rates for the largest ships to navigate the Panama Canal advanced 1.6 percent to $9,138 a day, according to the London-based Baltic Exchange. That’s the biggest one-day gain since March 7, data from the exchange show.
Argentina’s corn shipments are rising while Brazil is set to overtake the U.S. as the biggest soybean exporter this year, according to data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Panamax rates climbed for five consecutive days, the longest winning streak since one that ended March 25, bourse data show.
From Bloomberg
Chan Chiu-wai and Paddy Crumlin Radio Interview:
Hundreds of contract workers in the port of Hong Kong are on strike for decent pay and working conditions. Meanwhile port workers in Vancouver, USA, are locked out as their employer tries to break the union.
A RadioLabour interview with Chan Chiu-wai of the Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions and Paddy Crumlin, President of the International Transport Workers’ Federation.
To listen to the 8-minute interview, click here
The following opinion piece is co-authored by ILWU Local 23 President Scott Mason and Port of Tacoma CEO John Wolfe:
Unfortunately, as if the competitive threats from other ports aren’t enough, we now face a new threat from within our own state.
The Legislature has introduced a dramatic increase in the state business and occupation tax on the companies that load and unload cargo, as well as the public utility tax on the companies that move that cargo through the state.
It’s an idea that couldn’t come at a worse time. Other states are doing just the opposite.
Let’s grow the economy – which generates more taxes – instead of putting up new barriers that restrict economic growth.
Read the full opinion piece in the News Tribune
Source: Truthout
Source: WVGazette
A dock worker holds a defaced picture of Hong Kong’s richest man Li Ka-shing as he marches with others during a strike at Cheung Kong centre in Hong Kong, April 17, 2013. REUTERS/Tyrone Siu
More than 200 striking dock workers camped outside the headquarters of Asia’s richest man on Wednesday, pressing demands for a pay rise at a port operated by the tycoon that has disrupted traffic in the world’s third-largest container port.
Unionists say they have had no pay increase for 10 years. Other demands have included improved hygiene facilities.
Representatives of the 450 strikers said they would remain outside Cheung Kong Centre in the city’s financial district to persuade Li Ka-shing to intervene.
The workers, on strike for three weeks, seek an increase of about 20 percent from contractors who supply workers for port operator Hongkong International Terminals (HIT), a unit of Li’s Hutchison Whampoa.
“We’ll disperse our fellow workers to surround Cheung Kong Centre to force Li Ka-shing to take a stand,” said Stanley Ho, secretary-general of the Union of Hong Kong Dockers.
HIT has left it up to contractors and strikers to negotiate. It said last...
The following analysis is from the Japanese newspaper Asahi Shimbun:
Akira Amari, minister in charge of the TPP, said the United States, which has led the TPP negotiations, made a number of key demands of Japan because it is only now ready to join the TPP process. Amari said Japan and the United States will continue to discuss when U.S. tariffs on automobiles will be lifted.Despite Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s pledge to protect national interests, Japan appears set to lose far more than it will gain–at least initially–from joining the Trans-Pacific Partnership free trade deal.
Japan will make substantial concessions on automobiles to the United States, while it is unclear whether it can keep tariffs on key farm produce, according to a Japan-U.S agreement announced on April 12.
The United States will maintain a 2.5 percent tariff on cars and a 25 percent tariff on trucks for imports from Japan for the maximum period allowed under the TPP.
“We have been taken advantage of and forced to pay a steep admission fee,” lamented a senior official of the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry.
With U.S. approval effectively guaranteed, Japan is expected to...
A flier posted at the Maritime Union of Australia shows a few of the many reasons why Hong Kong dockworkers have been forced to strike for better working conditions:
Download the full flier at this MUA link.
USMX has issued the following news release:
Vote Concludes 13 Months of Negotiations with Longshoremen
NEWARK, N.J. (April 17, 2013) — After more than a year of bargaining, members of the United States Maritime Alliance, Ltd. (USMX) voted today to ratify a new six-year Master Contract with the International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA). The approval came eight days after ILA members voted overwhelmingly to ratify the contract, which covers 14,500 port workers on the East and Gulf Coasts.
Meeting near the Newark International Airport, representatives of the 43 container carriers, terminal operators and port associations that comprise USMX’s membership, voted their approval of a contract that includes three $1-an-hour wage increases over the six-year life of the agreement.
In separate votes last week, ILA members at 11 of the 14 East and Gulf Coast ports, including the Port of New York and New Jersey, the largest on the East Coast, approved separate local agreements covering work rules and other issues.
“The final approval of the Master Contract will come as welcome news to shippers, shipping companies, port operators and the tens of thousands of...
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