Export Transportation Bottlenecks

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The United States is experiencing its own export renaissance due to a generally weak dollar and a push by the Obama administration to double exports in five years.

But the one thing nobody is talking about? Shipping bottlenecks.

It's the opposite of what one might expect. Carriers have a surplus of ships. And since the U.S. still imports more than it exports, freighters arrive in America looking for export cargo to take back, so they don't have to go home empty. Yet American producers of everything from hazelnuts to cardboard are complaining they can't get their goods shipped in timely fashion. Eighty rail cars filled with dried peas sat for weeks on train tracks outside Seattle, waiting for a ship to India. Wheat for Asia is stuck in a warehouse in North Dakota.

It's a challenge.

Read more here.