1 Hanjin bankruptcy triggers global shipping chaos
(San Francisco Chronicle) The bankruptcy of the Hanjin shipping line has thrown
ports and retailers around the world into confusion, with giant container ships
marooned and merchants worrying whether tons of goods will reach their shelves.
The South Korean giant filed for bankruptcy
protection on Wednesday and stopped accepting new cargo. With its assets being
frozen, ships from China to Canada found themselves refused permission to
offload or take aboard containers because there were no guarantees that tugboat
pilots or stevedores would be paid.
There were reports that some Hanjin ships had been
seized in China on behalf of creditors. The National Retail Federation, the
world's largest retail trade association, wrote to US Secretary of Commerce
Penny Pritzker and Federal Maritime Commission Chairman Mario Cordero on
Thursday, urging them to work with the South Korean government, ports and
others to prevent disruption.
Hanjin, the world's seventh-largest container
shipper, represents nearly 8 percent of the trans-Pacific trade volume for the
US market and the bankruptcy is having "a ripple effect throughout the
global supply chain. The confusion might sink some trucking firms that contract
with Hanjin to deliver cargo containers carrying everything from electronics to
car parts from ports to company loading bays.
Hanjin has been losing money for years. It filed for
bankruptcy protection a day after its creditors, led by a state-run bank,
refused to prop it up. Other shipping lines were moving to take over some of
the Hanjin traffic but at a price. Their vessels already are operating at high
capacity because of the season and shippers may wind up paying a premium to
squeeze their cargo containers on board.
A weakened economy since the 2008 recession hurt
global demand and trade at the same time that steamship lines continued to
build more and larger vessels — immense ships that were conceived as
cost-effective when freight costs were higher several years ago. But the weaker
trade and overcapacity has sent ocean shipping rates plunging in recent years.
2 Walmart to cut 7,000 jobs (BBC) Walmart, the US
supermarket chain, plans to cut 7,000 back office and accounting jobs in its US
stores. The move comes after a pilot programme in 500 stores this summer that
tested a new accounting system.
A Walmart official said the employees affected by
the changes would have the option of moving into jobs serving customers if they
chose to stay. Walmart, the largest US employer, has been trying to increase
the number of staff who deal with customers.
Walmart said employees who stayed with the company
would have a choice of jobs, depending on their availability in the stores. This
could mean a change in pay or hours for those staff members.
Walmart, which has been the target of trade union
protests over low pay for the past few years, raised its minimum pay rate to
$10 per hour earlier this year and changed its scheduling system to improve
staffing at peak hours.
3 Dilma gone, Brazil’s political crisis lingers (Paulo
Pinheiro in The Guardian) The vote that sealed Michel Temer’s installation into
power in Brazil took place precisely one week after the end of the Rio Olympic
Games and just days before the G20 summit. Everything was carefully planned to
make the arbitrary removal of a democratically elected president look like
business as usual.
That’s not to say the new leadership in Brazil isn’t
worried about whether it appears legitimate. Over the past few months, the
alliance forged to oust Dilma Rousseff rejected calling the impeachment process
that it was sponsoring a coup d’état.
Rousseff’s fate was decided long before the last
vote in the senate, by the collapse of the heterogeneous coalition that
sustained her government and that made her the easy prey of an
ultra-conservative legislature rattled by uncontrolled corruption
investigations.
The impeachment of Rousseff will leave deep scars in
political and institutional life. Not only will the country be headed by an
artificial leadership arrangement; the new coalition comes to power imposing a
radical turn to the right which was defeated in four previous elections.
In Brazil it is clear that the combined economic and
political crisis is offering a golden opportunity for an ultra-conservative
alliance to regain control of power and demolish part of the legacy of the
brief democratic experience. Such a dramatic ending of what was once believed
to be one of the very few positive experiences of pragmatic left leadership in
the global south will certainly resonate beyond its borders, particularly in
Latin America.
Your blog was absolutely fantastic! Great deal of great information and this can be useful some or maybe the other way. Keep updating your blog,anticipating to get more detailed contents.
ReplyDeleteVehicle Shipping From Alaska