DC Velocity - April 2010

inbound

what the fork?

It was a long, slow, cold journey, but a team of three in late February successfully drove a forklift truck from John O’Groats in Scotland, the northernmost point in Great Britain, to Land’s End in Cornwall, the island’s southwestern extremity. According to reports in several U.K. publications, the idea for the four-day journey was hatched by Stuart Colvin (a professional lift-truck driver and instructor), Steve Hare, and Steve Golding to raise money for cancer research in memory of a friend, Tim Frankham, who died of a brain tumor in May 2009. The three wanted to do something in keeping with Frankham’s positive attitude and sense of humor.

“Team Tim” drove in four-hour shifts, finishing up on what would have been Frankham’s 43rd birthday. The 915-mile route is a popular one for charity walks and bike rides, but this undoubtedly was the first time the trip—described by Frankham’s widow, Helene, as “one of the most bum numbing of escapades”—was carried out via material handling equipment. Her description was more accurate than she might have imagined: The drive began in a surprise snowstorm.

Jungheinrich UK Ltd. loaned the diesel-powered counterbalanced truck to the three adventurers.

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Friedmann’s fearless forecast: 2010 edition

Peter A. Friedmann’s rapid-fire rundown of issues affecting international traders is one of the highlights of the Coalition of New England Companies for Trade’s (CONECT) Northeast Trade and Transportation Conference each year. Friedmann, a trade attorney, represents CONECT in Washington.

Here are a few observations from this year’s address, delivered in Newport, R.I., last month:

; Bottleneck in Congress. Congress is too busy with the health-care debate to tackle issues like transportation infrastructure and confirming a new commissioner of Customs and Border Protection (CBP). “But sometimes gridlock in Washington isn’t a bad thing,” Friedmann said, because it means “foolish” legislation, such as a current proposal to repeal NAFTA, won’t get passed.

; Battle on the border. When Congress suspended a cross-border trucking program, Mexico retaliated by slapping $2.4 billion in tariffs on U.S. goods. As a result, U.S. jobs have been lost. One example: Mary Kay Cosmetics, which went from zero duties to $400,000 per month on imports into Mexico. Mary Kay is still selling in Mexico, Friedmann noted, “but [it’s] now manufacturing in China instead of in the United States.”

; Be green—or else. Industry can’t afford to watch passively while the federal government forces businesses to reduce emissions. “If we don’t do it ourselves, [Congress and the EPA will] do it for us, and it won’t be the right way,” Friedmann said. “It will be unwieldy and burdensome, and it will impede world trade.”

; ACE: The saga continues. CBP’s Automated Commercial Environment (ACE), the whiz-bang IT system that will replace the current overburdened system, is still a work in progress some 20 years after its conception. Congress won’t provide more money for ACE this year, Friedmann predicted. “A lot of people on Capitol Hill are asking, ‘How many billions does it take to write a software program?’ Even its defenders are embarrassed.” ;

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