How will ports respond to the SOLAS challenge?

The relative merits of using an operating port rather than a landlord port have come into sharp relief recently as shippers confront the compliance deadline for the amendment to the International Maritime Organization’s Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS) convention.

To date, the only major operating port committed to helping shippers with the verified gross mass (VGM) weighing is the South Carolina Ports Authority. It’s also offering to generate VGM documentation for outbound cargo.

In a letter to its members, the Agriculture Transportation Coalition (AgTC), characterized this move as “throwing down the gauntlet” to other ports in the Southeast…and perhaps nationally.

Exporters also get a break from The Georgia Ports Authority, which will weigh shippers’ containers at no cost, notes AgTC executive director, Peter Friedmann.

“The Port of Savannah will continue to weigh trucks carrying containers into the port at its truck gates as it has done for years, but it now will offer to share those documented weights with shippers, carriers and stevedores,” he adds.

West Coast shippers may be eyeing the response made by the ports of Seattle, Tacoma and Portland – which represent “hybrid” models. These gateways function as both landlord and operational ports

Being operational, however, is no slam dunk when it comes to helping shippers out of this miasma The gulf port of Houston has flatly stated that will not accept containers at terminal gates that do not have a certified container weight electronically on file prior to arrival.

We agree with Friedmann that with under 60 days before the SOLAS rule takes effect, the pressure on shippers, carriers, marine terminals and ports “is all but guaranteed to intensify.”