Box traffic slows in February at ports of Los Angeles, Long Beach

CARGO traffic at the US west coast ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach has slowed in February, with both container imports and exports down.

Imports into the twin harbour complex declined further in February to a low not seen since 1997, while exports were sharply lower.

Most of the trade numbers coming out of Asia are still pretty extreme in terms of the speed of decline, said Nigel Gault, chief US economist for business research firm IHS Global Insight. It's been rather unprecedented... We will see some bottoming out, Mr Gault was quoted as saying in a report by the Los Angeles Times. We can't go down much longer or there will be no trade left.

At the Port of Los Angeles, the number of containers carrying imported goods decreased in February by 35.3 per cent compared to the same month a year earlier to 206,035 containers, marking the lowest monthly total for imports since May 2001. Exports declined 27.6 per cent year on year to 111,595 boxes from 154,127 in February 2008, it said.

The Port of Long Beach suffered an even worse decline, partly because the low volumes meant that shipping lines were using smaller vessels and no longer had as much need for Long Beach's naturally deep harbour. February imports fell by 43.3 per cent year on year to 92,781 containers. Exports slumped by 37 per cent to 92,781 containers, down from 147,275 in February 2008.

Hopefully, we will see some kind of upswing in the month of March, but there's just not enough confidence out there for people to start buying again, said Dick Steinke, the Long Beach Port's executive director.

Source: Schednet