A Year In Review

By John McLaurin, Vice President, Pacific Merchant Shipping Association

The end of the year is a good time for reflection – to look back on the past twelve months and measure it against one’s expectations, hopes, and dreams. On a personal level, the year was a series of wide, deep, and sometimes painful fluctuations. Family became closer and more important than ever – but for all of the wrong reasons. I hate cancer more than ever before. I will be glad to raise a glass on New Year’s Eve and say goodbye to 2019.

For the nation, 2019 was also a year in which the concept of truth in our political and governmental systems became less relevant. Governance has become a forgotten art form. It has lost out to the desire to simply retain (or seek) political power. Politics, long described as a full-contact sport, has become a vicious blood sport where the infliction of pain to one’s opponent is far more important than solving problems for the common good.

With regard to the West Coast trade community, it has been a difficult year. Market share continues to decline – and does not show signs of changing any time soon. The Trump tariffs are definitely having an impact on cargo volumes, but those impacts deal primarily with the suppression of cargo volumes. The shifting of cargo away from West Coast ports has been well documented and commented on by Jock O’Connell in these pages over the past few years.

There are some who state that publicly discussing the loss of West Coast market share is a self-fulfilling prophecy. I wish international trade could be influenced in such a simplistic way. As Jock has pointed out numerous times, the rerouting of cargo from the West Coast is due to a number of systemic and structural changes. The challenge for 2020 is whether, collectively, West Coast supply chain stakeholders and public officials have the capacity to engage in an honest discussion and come together to redirect our focus about how to compete with other North American gateways.

This is a discussion that should be done openly, publicly, and be guided by hard facts and analysis. It will not be an easy discussion. To regain lost volumes of cargo in 2020 and beyond requires innovation, not the maintenance of outdated legacy operating systems. It requires recognition of the importance of trade on our local economy – and the realization and acknowledgment that it cannot be taken for granted. And it requires us to avoid self-inflicted wounds.

Our world is changing, irrespective of our national trade policies. We have to fight to regain what we have lost. Silence and inaction is not an option. Happy New Year.