While 2021 has been one heck of a year, from the Ever Given getting stuck in the Suez Canal at the beginning of the year to an increase in forced labor concerns as CBP issued many Xingang-originating Withhold Release Orders, it’s been a wild ride.
We can’t forget that the Ever Given was the ship that put the Global Supply Chain on the map for everyone to talk about. It started out as a crisis turned into a joke for late-night comics and people making memes, but it also taught people to start paying attention to the supply chain in ways they never had before. Turns out, that armchair expertise has come in handy as 2021 progressed.
The congestion this year has brought was only just starting, compounding even more with little events like the Ever Given making things worse all alone the trade route. From LA and LB ports setting a record for the Western Hemisphere and processing 10 million TEU’s (twenty-foot equivalent units) in a 12 month period, to the congestion that piled on the ports for months on end until it became more of a parking lot than a port; and a port fee was passed with no cap in sight to make them move cargo faster. This in turn was put off by the White House being billed to the carriers because of how quickly things began moving.
The Port of Charleston handled 205,008 Twenty-foot Equivalent Units (TEUs), achieving a record in September, as well as being a 5% increase year-over-year in total TUEs processed. In fact, South Carolina ports set continuous records throughout the year, but that didn’t stop the rest of the Western Hemisphere from getting congested left and right with air cargo following ocean cargo and getting stopped up as well.
Overall it’s been a crazy year, but we’ve made it through one shipment at a time, and here’s to looking forward to the new year to make things even greater than before!