Import cargo volume at the nation’s major retail container ports is expected to be up 13 percent in March compared with the same month a year ago, and double-digit increases are expected to continue through the summer as the U.S. economy begins in improve, according to the monthly Global Port Tracker report released today by the National Retail Federation and Hackett Associates.
“These numbers show that retailers continue to anticipate improvements in the U.S. economy,” NRF Vice President for Supply Chain and Customs Policy Jonathan Gold said. “This is very different from the past two years when merchants were continually cutting their imports in an effort to manage inventory.”
U.S. ports handled 1.08 million Twenty-foot Equivalent Units in January, the latest month for which actual numbers are available. That was down just under 1 percent from December as imports wound down after the holiday season, but up 2 percent from January 2009. It was also the second month in a row to show a year-over-year improvement after December broke a 28-month streak of year-over-year monthly declines. One TEU is one 20-foot cargo container or its equivalent.
February was estimated at 1.08 million TEU, the same as January but a 29 percent increase over unusually low numbers in February 2009, and March is forecast at 1.09 million TEU, up 13 percent from the previous year. April is forecast at 1.17 million TEU, up 19 percent as retailers begin to stock up for spring and summer, May at 1.21 million TEU, up 17 percent, June at 1.26 million TEU, up 25 percent, and July at 1.33 million TEU, up 20 percent.
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