The Massachusetts Export Center hosted its ninth annual Mass Export Expo on Friday, December 7th. Although the conference was regional in nature, the topics of discussion are currently of great interest to businesses across the country and even across the globe. There were a number of sessions on topics ranging from US-China trade, US economic sanctions, the recently established USMCA, and much more. The panels included a number of corporate compliance officers and attorneys that […]
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Archive for Global Trade
Tariffs and duties and data – oh my. The need for digitization grows as importers struggle to mitigate the impact of shifting trade policy, demand fluctuations, compliance risks, and duty exposure. In an uncertain international trade environment, “trade war” has become a buzzword sending importers into a frenzy on how to prepare their supply chains for the unknown and mitigate risk to their forecast. Proposed tariffs, retaliatory trade restrictions, or even temporary reductions on tariffs […]
Read More →I recently began the update of ARC Advisory Group’s research on the global trade management solutions market. At the outset, it was unclear to me how (or even if) the increased global trade uncertainty would impact the market for GTM solutions. In early 2017 there were two theses as to how the uncertainty from Brexit and Trump’s rhetoric on trade agreements would affect business activity. One view was that increased uncertainty would hinder trade volumes, put terms […]
Read More →Import tariffs and potential trade wars have been a hot topic in the media since Trump was elected President. My colleagues and I have written about the topic a number of times on Logistics Viewpoints, as well. However, much of the news propagates recent announcements and often includes an opinion on the subject matter. I thought it would be helpful to take an empirical look at import data surrounding tariff announcements and implementations to determine […]
Read More →President Trump has been quite vocal when discussing US trade deals, often lamenting how the US has been getting the short end of the stick on almost every trade deal. One of his first moves as President was to pull the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) citing it as a bad deal. Since then, the President has been renegotiating NAFTA (another “bad deal” for the US), and imposing tariffs on goods imported worldwide. The […]
Read More →A.T. Kearney publishes an annual study on reshoring. Their July 2018 release – their fourth annual “Reshoring Index” – shows record imports from traditional offshoring countries in 2017. “Imports of manufactured goods into the United States from the 14 largest low-cost-country trading partners in Asia rose by a staggering $55 billion, or 8 percent—the largest one-year increase since the economic recovery of 2011. Tariffs and political pressure is unlikely to change things very much in the near term because changing global supply chains is not quick or easy.
Read More →Just this week, forecasters warned that the 2018 hurricane season could be more active than usual, unfortunately as busy as the stormy 2017 season that brought unprecedented damage to many areas. What does this have to do with the supply chain? Shippers know all too well that the strain on truck capacity and supply chain resources continues to have an impact, and the overall capacity issue will remain for the long-haul. A wait-and-see approach by […]
Read More →You could call it the perfect capacity storm, as a number of the same challenges that U.S. domestic shippers are encountering are also impacting cross-border logistics in Mexico. In addition to factors such as the ELD mandate and recent extreme winter weather conditions, the upcoming peak produce shipping season in Mexico is set to put additional pressure on capacity and create unexpected costs for carriers and shippers alike. So, how can cross-border shippers combat some […]
Read More →The trade industry certainly loves buzzwords, and ‘control tower’ gets serious air time in our industry. But, what really is a control tower and how does it relate to your supply chain operations? When we think of control tower capabilities, we envision an airport control tower or a scenario like NASA mission control. Folks buzzing around with big screens showing various views of activity, blips moving across space and lots of communication going on. The […]
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Supply Chain Brief
Tariff Impact: What You Can Do Now to Manage Risk
As U.S. importers, we live in interesting times. It can seem overwhelming just to keep up with what’s changing in tariffs, let alone know the full impact of those changes on your business. This quick summary brings you up to date on what’s happened in U.S. tariffs this year so far. It also provides ideas that can help you manage potential disruptions to your supply chain as developments continue to unfold. First, a quick recap […]
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