Top Port of Los Angeles executive rings bell for changes in how ports operate

At a time when the combination of the COVID-19 pandemic and the ongoing United States-China trade war continue to have a detrimental effect on container shipping, and the supply chain, at large, the head of the nation’s largest port says it is time for the port to reinvent itself.

That was the word from Gene Seroka, executive director of the Port of Los Angeles (POLA).

Speaking on a video conference call hosted by POLA for the media yesterday, Seroka said that by his estimation POLA will have a permanent loss in the neighborhood of 15% of its imports that won’t return, due to current trade policies.

“We are also facing, as always, fierce competition from other North American trade gateways…so our strategic focus will be on competitiveness, cargo fluidity, marine operations, and our rail and truck activities to make sure we are operating as smoothly as possible,” he said. “One silver lining may be that with the loss of imports, we may just have a chance to have a better balance of trade with imports and exports, which, in effect, could lower our costs to serve, making use a more desirable trade gateway.”

With that as a backdrop, the top POLA executive explained that he is calling for a nationwide port community sharing system to help U.S.-based exporters, manufacturers, farmers, and others bounce back and re-assert their competitiveness with effect to their customers overseas.

This will be done, he said, by having data and technology bring containers, rail and truck service along with shipping schedules together to make sure that these companies have a chance to re-enter into the economic recovery.

“I have also called together and put together a West Coast coalition of business interests to answer that question of port competitiveness,” he said. “It incudes the five major container ports on the West Coast, the employers association, the PMSA (Pacific Merchant Shipping Association), long shore labor at the international and local levels, as well as the two western railroads. Our work in this area will be focused on operations, financial investment, at the transactional, as well as detail level on digital and physical infrastructure and the work we need to do in the political and regulatory environments.”

These efforts will have a strong focus on U.S. exports, including agriculture, manufacturing, and automotive, as well as their tiered suppliers, according to Seroka.

As for what efforts are currently being made for the nationwide port community system, Seroka pointed to how POLA is working with Federal Maritime Commission (FMC) Commissioner Rebecca Dye, whom has been a longstanding advocate across all sectors of the supply chain, as POLA has come to know through user discovery sessions and focus groups.

“Our job here is to make our American ports more competitive nationally on the global stage of international trade,” he said. “This is not a commercial play, it is not to look at somebody’s data and try to sell it. We have proven that now by having our port community system in place for nearly four years. The idea is the quicker we can see what cargo is flowing and what is being planned to ship, how we can anticipate those vessels and the work that we need to do, the better we can communicate with the asset-owning partners, our long shore labor workforce, truck drivers and those who really play a huge role in the physical movement of cargo. We have talked about this for a long time, and I believe now, as the American economy attempts to reemerge, we need to take a forward looking step and by sharing information through a platform of standardized milestones and the technology we now have with API to speed data through systems, the time is now to act.”

Seroka stressed that this is about what POLA (and other ports) can do better, how it can attract cargo, and deliver value to the customers that want to use its port complex.

“Even today, we have more than 200,000 cargo owners that have shipments through this port every year and, at the same time now, I think we all recognize that bringing people to the table can effect change—these are C-suite decision makers— [is needed],” he said. “It is not just wrestling cargo between ports or trying to say we are up one month and brag about it and are then down the next month; it is about real change that we need to make in our offering to the decision makers in the supply chain.” 

The objectives that POLA is aiming to go after, according to Seroka, include:

• how can it run its operations like a fine-tuned machine?;
• how can it address the financial question?; and
• what do it do do about the Harbor Maintenance Trust and get donor equity?

Thus far, he said that HMT revenues have been distributed to POLA competitors that helps the take market share from POLA, he said which, in turn leads to a need for change at the policy level.

“We have people that have been working on Capitol Hill trying to get that done,” he said. “We also need to make sure our investments in physical and digital infrastructure have long running traction, as well the deeper channel, wider berths, and the turning circles. All of that is imperative to us. We need to do more and be faster at getting alignment with our elected and appointed officials and with those at the various agencies to make sure we are not scaring cargo away. That is also a moving part of this. It is a huge lift and it is a generational change that we are asking for in the way that west coast ports operate, especially POLA, but I think we have enough momentum and a lot of people behind this that we can chip away at this.”