Archive For The “Trucking Reports” Category
Entering the lightest season volume wise for produce loads, it’s not uncommon for multiple pick ups and drops to fill out the trailer. Pick ups starting in southern California may extend to the California desert, Yuma and perhaps even Nogales. Changes for the better are occuring at the Arizona, Mexico border that should improve produce crossings in the USA and reduce delays for loadings at the many Nogales warehouses.
The Mariposa port was built in the 1970s, designed to handled 400 trucks crossing into Arizona daily. Over the years changes have increased the truck count to around 1600 to 1800 a day. In the past an estimated 25 percent of the trucks crossing the border into Arizona were delayed because of gridlock on the Mariposa Road (State Route 189), which connects the port to I-19. Numerous stop lights on the state route often contribute to the delays.
In 2009 a $220 million expansion of the port was started and is scheduled for completion in 2014. This should increase traffic capabilities to 4,000 to 5,000 trucks a day crossing the border in Nogales.
Meanwhile, there is light volume of watermelon, honeydew, squash, bell peppers, tomatoes and other items crossing the border from Mexico, it will be another month of so before the volume really improves.
Nogales produce is grossing about $3400 to Chicago, about $5800 to New York.
Strawberry shipments from the Plant City, FL area have been underway for more than a month, but only in very light volume. This is changing as available loads will show significant increases by December 10, and be in big volume around December 15-20. Central Florida also has very light volume with cherry, grape, roma and green tomatoes. The area also is shipping variety of vegetables. However, this overall is seasonally a very light volume period for Florida. Expect multiple pickups to involved with most loads.
You may even have to fill out the trailer from those Florida pick ups with a few pallets of cabbage, greens or broccoli from Southern Georgia. In fact, the whole Eastern seaboard extending into the Northeast and New England doesn’t hold a lot of volume, but sometimes something is better than nothing.
In eastern growing areas of North Carolina, the biggest volume is with sweet potatoes, not necessarily known for paying the best freight rates…..In upstate New York, Orange County is shipping storage onions, while central and western areas are loading cabbage. New York apples were hit pretty hard by freezing weather earlier this year, especially from western and central shipping points. Even the Hudson Valley did not escape the freeze, although it came out better than the rest of the state.
In northern Maine, Aroostoock County is shipping around 150 truck loads of potatoes a week.
Maine potatoes – grossing about $1700 to New York City.
North Carolina sweet potatoes – about $1500 to Atlanta.
Florida vegetables and strawberries – about $2600 to Boston.
Christmas is only three weeks away and produce holiday shipments have already started with some items.
The last of fresh cranberry loads are now moving to USA markets, but primarily from Central Wisconsin. While Massachusetts often promises Christmas shipments, it has a checkered history of actually delivering, primarily due to quality issues and the demand from the processing marketing.
Probably the most reliable is The Cranberry Network LLC, Wisconsin Rapids, Wis., which markets fruit grown by Tomah, WI-based Habelman Bros. Co., the nation’s largest fresh cranberry grower. It plans on packing and shipping fresh-market cranberries through mid-December.
In Texas, the Winter Garden District located just south of San Antonio is gearing up with cabbage, broccoli and onion shipments. Further south in the Lower Rio Grande Valley, there are grapefruit and orange loads available, as well as a variety of vegetables, not only from the valley, but crossing the border from Mexico.
California
California has a big clementine crop this season coming out of the San Joaquin Valley. The valley continues to ship a record setting table grape crop, which will be winding down in coming weeks.
In the desert areas of California (Imperial Valley) and Arizona (Yuma), volume is increasing on vegetables. Last winter was very mild and unlike many past winters, picks and loads were not significantly disrupted by weather factors. Odds are this won’t happen in two consecutive years, but we’ll find out in the weeks and months ahead.
Imports
Imported Spanish clementines arriving on the East Coast are expected to be 25-30 percent lower than last season.
Importers of Peruvian and Chilean onions expect good movement and good quality with winter approaching. Arrivals are taking place now with onions from Peru, while onions from Chile will start arriving anytime, a 20 percent drop is seen.
Imperial Valley vegetables – grossing about $3800 to Chicago.
The South American country of Chile provides a substantial portion of loadings of fruit (not to mention for consumer consumption) beginning in the new few weeks and continuing well into the New Year. While some Chilean fruit arrives by air early in the season, the vast majority of it is shipped by boat arriving at ports in Philadelphia; Wilmington, NC and Long Beach, CA.
Over 75 varieties of fruit are imported each year from Chile, but the five top items providing you with loading opportunities are grapes, apples, avocados, blueberries and navel oranges. These account for about 75 percent of the volume. Limited amounts of fruit already are arriving by air, particularly cherries. However, volume will pick up significantly in December, but heaviest volumes with the biggest item – grapes arrving by boat — is typically during January, February, March and April.
Table Grapes
Heaviest arrivals at USA ports for grapes is expected to be at the beginning of the season – starting in late December, with a second peak in volume occuring in late March or early April.
Blueberries
The first “blues” will arrive by air in early December, with arrivals by boat at USA ports coming by the middle of the month. Chilean blueberries should be available for hauls into April. However, your best loading opportunities will during the peak volume period of about December 21st to February 22nd.
Cherries
The first boat with cherries should arrive on the East Coast between December 6-10. There were 3 million boxes of Chilean cherries imported a year ago, although imports are expected to be somewhat lower this time around.
Stone Fruit
Heaviest volume is with plums, although there are lesser amounts of nectarines and peaches. Plums tend to have less quality problems, followed by nectarines. Chile seems to have a lot of quality problems with peaches, and this is something to keep in mind when hauling this winter fruit. Your chances of claims and rejections may increase.
Other Fruit
Chilean kiwifruit and Asian pears will start arriving at USA ports in lat March, with sugar plums coming in late April. These will be followed by persimmons, pomegranates and quinces in spring and summer.
Having opposite seasons from the USA, southern hemisphere countries such as Chile make it possible to have fruit on a year around basis.
This is Thanksgiving week and transportation needs and availability tend to get a little funky, or unpreditable. Thanksgiving shipments have pretty much taken place, so the greatest need for trucks is expected to come as receivers relpinsh stocks following the long holidayweekend.
The New York and Michigan apple industries got clobbered this season by bad weather, and shipments are expected to remain at record levels from both the Yakima Valley and Wenachee Valley. The 2012-13 crop year – 121.5 million boxes could be shipped.
A breakdown by apple variety, also shows in millions of boxes, the following: Red Delicious/32.986; Golden Delicious/11.384; Granny Smith/11.163; Fuji/14.796; Gala/19.915; Braeburn/2.031; Jonagold/0.79; Cameo/0.618; Cripps Pink/2.81; Honeycrisp/2.95; and others/2.982.
As of November 1st, approximately 19.1 million boxes of apples had been shipped. As of the same date in 2011, approximately 14.6 million boxes had been loaded. During 2010, that number was 14.2 million boxes.
Pears
Through early November, Northwest growers had shipped 31 percent of the 2012-13 crop, up from 25% at the same time last year.
The 19.2 million boxes expected this year are down from last year’s 20.5 million-box record crop, but overall shipments should be right at the five-year average.
Potatoes and Onions
Washington state also is a major shipper of potatoes and onions, with the vast majority of loads originating from the Columbia Basin and extending into the Umatilla Basin of Oregon.
This area combined is accounting for nearly 750 truck load equivalents of onions on a weekly basis, and another 500 truck load equivalents of potatoes each week.
Washington state potatoes and onions – grossing about $6200 to Atlanta.
Washington state apples and pears – about $5400 to New York City.
California Navel orange shipments for the 2012-13 season is estimated at 93 million cartons (40-pound equivalent) statewide and 90 million cartons for the San Joaquin Valley, according to the USDA.
While shipments for California Navels should be heavy, it will probably be short of a record. The record was hit in the 2010-11 season, when the Central Valley alone produced 93 million cartons, and up 6 percent from the 2011-12 loads.
The first shipments took place in early November.
Red potato shipments out of North Dakota and Minnesota are nearly 35 percent head of loadings through October than they were during he same fall period a year ago. Red River Valley fresh potato shipments are expected to be the largest since 2008.
The total USA potato volume is estimated to be at least 12 million hundredweight larger than a year ago.
The North American Potato Market news is reporting that average daily shipments of russets has dropped 0.6 percent compared to last year while daily red shipments increased 18 percent.
Texas citrus season is in full swing, and shipping has begun for grapefruit and oranges. The USDA forecast for the 2012 – 2013 Texas citrus season is 2.8 million cartons of oranges and 10.6 million cartons of grapefruit.
Moderate shipments of watermelons from Mexico will continue crossing the border into Nogales, AZ through the end of the year. Overall Mexican fruit and vegetable crossing at Nogales are seasonally light, but the will change in Janaury as a host of produce items will be increasing in volume.
While head lettuce shipments continue from the Salinas Valley and the Huron District in the San Joaquin Valley, volume is rapidly decreasing as the seasonal shift if well underway and volume increases from the desert areas of the Imperial Valley in Southern California and in the nearby Yuma district of Arizona.
Normal shipments are expected from the desert areas through the end of the year. Loadings for romaine from the Imperial Valley should start the week after Thanksgiving.
Lettuce loads from the Salinas Vallely are expected to overlap the Imperial Valley season by a week or two.
Record shipments of tables grapes continues from the San Joaquin Valley spanning the Kern District to the northern part of the valley is averaging over 1,600 truckloads per week…..Also from the Kern District is shipments of carrots, averaging about 350 truckload equivalents per week.
Strawberry shipments from the Watsonville District are in a seasonal decline, while volume is picking up from Ventura County. Moderate volume continues from the Santa Maria District. As with many vegetables in California, berry volume is much lower than only a few weeks ago.
There’s a number of produce items in California providing light volume, but at this point may be helping to fill out the truck. Those items may range from oranges to lemons, kiwi, various veggies and even holiday product such as pomegrantes.
San Joaquin Valley produce – grossing about $4400 to Chicago.
Florida certainly isn’t a destination many produce haulers seek in the fall, unless they are taking a vacation. It is historically quite difficult to find return loads out of the Sunshine state after delivering there. Still, here’s a look at what should be available with citrus and vegetable loads during the next couple of months.
There will be fewer navel oranges available, but larger volumes of grapefruit and tangerines as Florida’s early season shipments move to bigger volumes. The USDA issued on October 11th it’s first season forecast. Florida expects to ship 2.2 million equivalent cartons of navels, 17 percent less than a year ago. Although fewer loads are forecast, it still is a decent volume for the state. While citrus shipments are moving into good volume, lighter movement is seen starting in late December and early January.
Fall vegetable loadings from Central and Southern Florida are expected to be down from a year ago, particularly with items such as sweet corn, green beans, bell peppers, cucumbers and squash. While the harvest began last month, we’re looking at mid November to around Thanksgiving before better volume starts.
While plantings of Florida fall veggies are generally lower this season, larger volume with strawberries from the Plant City area is expected. Light harvest starts in late November with volume and shipments increasing during December.
Shipments of some Thanksgiving produce favorites could be light this year.
For example , in the Glades/Lake Okeechobee region of Florida the was excessive rains during plantings from mid-September to mid-October. This may significantly reduce loads of green beans for the holidays, perhaps has much as 50 percent. Also be on the look out for wind damage to some vegetable items such as green beans, due to winds from Hurricane Sandy.
Other growing regions in south Florida will likely face similar reduced shipments.
Sweet potatoes
Sweet potato sales have increased to the point where normal times of the years, sales are close to those around the holidays.
Mississippi sweet potato shipments are expected to be lighter for Thanksgiving because of weather factors.
Cranberries
In Massachusetts and Wisconsin cranberries loads may down 10 percent. These two states account for the vast majority of fresh cranberry shipments. Make sure companies paying for the freight are aware the berries are smaller than normal this season.
Here’s a look at available fresh produce loads in the Western half of the USA where volume is primarily steady, or increasing.
In South Texas, avocados from Mexico are providing over 600 truckload equivalents per week and the volume will be increasing in the weeks ahead….South Texas grapefruit loadings are very light, but have started, and will hit good volume around mid- November….In West Texas in the Hereford area, as well as in nearby Eastern New Mexico, there is light volume with potatoes.
Looking at the San Luis Valley of south-central Colorado, about 500 truckloads of russett potatoes are being shipped weekly.
Idaho has another huge crop of russet potatoes. While the railroads move a significant amount of the state’s spuds, the majority of the volume still is shipped by truck. Nearly 1,700 truckload equivalents of potatoes are providing loads on a weekly basis.
California’s San Joaquin Valley is shipping everything from grapes to carrots and tomatoes, among other items. Over 2,000 truckloads of grapes are being shipped weekly from vineyards spread between the Bakersfield area to Merced. Decent volume with tomatoes also are available, but a seasonal decline will continue in coming weeks.
In Washington state, apples from the Yakima and Wenatchee valleys may be providing the single largest amounts of fruit volume in the country. A huge apple crop is averaging about 2,500 truckload equipments on a weekly basis.