BY MARK B. SOLOMON, SENIOR EDITOR
PORTS
A maritime supply chain buffeted by
repeated labor unrest may not have
much choice but to ‘grin and bear it’
in the future, experts say.
Labor pains Labor pains
MUCH HAS BEEN MADE ABOUT THE WANING
influence of organized labor in the United States. But try
telling that to the thousands of businesses whose supply
chains were at the mercy of the two waterfront unions
that flexed their muscles in 2012 like they haven’t in
years.
Those who rely on the International Longshoremen’s
Association (ILA) to move their goods in and out of 14
East and Gulf Coast ports breathed a sigh of relief Feb. 1
when it was announced the ILA and the U.S. Maritime
Alliance, representing ship management at the ports, had
reached a tentative six-year contract agreement. The
pact, which at press time still was subject to ratification
on both sides and to the negotiation of local agreements
impacting each port, averted a Feb. 7 work stoppage and
keeps the ports open for business.
The master agreement, if it holds, would end a standoff that began late last summer and that twice pushed
the ports to the brink of being shut down. The agreement came just five days before the third extension in
five months was to expire.
Though cargo had moved unimpeded during the dispute, businesses that rely on dockworkers to handle their
freight spent a skittish six months reviewing their contingency playbooks, putting them away when it looked
like the logjam would break, only to take them out again
when all seemed lost.
Businesses shipping in and out of the nation’s largest
port complex, the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach,
weren’t as fortunate. In late November, an 800-member
clerical workers unit of the International Longshore
and Warehouse Union (ILWU) struck the port complex. The ILWU dockworkers honored the strikers, this
time shutting down Los Angeles and significantly curtailing operations at Long Beach. Before the walkout
ended eight days later, about 40 percent of the nation’s
import tonnage had been affected, at a cost of roughly
$8 billion.
A week earlier, 220 members of the Service Employees
International Union (SEIU) walked off their jobs at the
Port of Oakland (Calif.). As they would do in the Los
Angeles basin, ILWU workers honored the SEIU picket
lines, shutting the port’s operations for a day.
The battles aren’t over. In the Pacific Northwest, ILWU
members at six grain-handling terminals at the Port of
Portland and the Washington state ports of Puget Sound
