After a hiatus that has lasted a month so
far, the Hanjin shipping company is expected to resume regular calls at the
Port of Portland, Oregon starting this weekend.
“We are very pleased to welcome Hanjin’s
container service back to Portland,” Sam Ruda, the chief commercial officer for
the Port of Portland, said. “The arrival of the Mundra will certainly assist the process of restoring confidence
for all industry stakeholders.”
Hanjin Shipping suspended calls at the port
in June as a response to an ongoing labor dispute involving two unions, the
International Longshore and Warehouse Union and the International Brotherhood
of Electrical Workers.
The conflict goes back to earlier this
year, when the ILWU began insisting that its contract with the Pacific Maritime
Association requires the terminal operator to hire longshore workers to handle
the plugging and unplugging of refrigerated containers at Terminal 6, work that
until recently had been performed by the IBEW.
Although the case is still working itself
out in the legal system and is anticipated to continue for the next several
months, the Hanjin Mundra is expected
to arrive at Terminal 6 sometime Sat. Aug. 4.
The labor issues have resulted in fewer
vessel calls, affecting the flow of containerized cargo not just at the port,
but in the entire region. In June, a noticeable drop in productivity began,
which the container operator, ICTSI Oregon, and other stakeholders labeled a
work slowdown by the ILWU.
Although the union denied it was engaging
in a slowdown, a federal judge in July issued an indefinite injunction banning
slowdowns pending the results of an investigation on the matter by the National
Labor Relations Board.
Hanjin, which is Portland’s largest
international carrier, isn’t the only company to bypass the port in recent
weeks. Hapag-Lloyd bypassed Portland twice, but has since resumed its service
on a week-to-week basis. Another carrier, Westwood Shipping, has maintained its
monthly service to the port.
