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Other viable markets for US soybean exporters are Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, Indonesia, Vietnam, Thailand, Mexico and North Africa, Steenhoek said.

Brazil and Argentina are the largest competitors of US soybean exporters in the China market.

Ongoing unpredictability

US agricultural shippers last year faced a host of supply chain issues, including draft restrictions at the Panama Canal and attacks on commercial vessels in the Red Sea by Houthi militants, forcing the diversion of most liner traffic around southern Africa.

Shippers also had to contend with the threat of a second strike by the International Longshoremen’ s Association( ILA) against employers at East and Gulf coasts, after a brief work stoppage in early October. Discretionary cargo diverted to the West Coast resulted in extended rail container dwell times and congestion in Seattle-Tacoma and Los Angeles-Long Beach.

Struggles continue as carriers attain poor on-time reliability to both coasts, which makes it difficult for US exporters to keep to the delivery schedules their overseas buyers rely on for supply chain reliability, Steenhoek said.

“ The power of predictability is compromised,” Steenhoek said.“ I would rather service be consistently good than occasionally exceptional.”

Besides unreliability on the ocean side, cotton shippers face continually changing delivery deadlines for their loaded containers at marine terminals and inland hub, which disrupts supply chains and causes tangible costs for exporters, said Mike Symonanis, director of strategic network at Louis Dreyfus.

Ag exports wilting after 13-month growth streak

Containerized US agricultural exports, in laden TEUs, with year-over-year change

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“ We are live-load shippers,” Symonanis said.

Agricultural shippers said that in the volatile environment of tariffs and counter-tariffs, they are stepping up their lobbying in Washington through trade organizations to ensure that Congress and the White House understand the importance of ag exports to the US economy.

“ This is our first, second and third objective,” said the American Cotton Shippers Association’ s Allen.

email: bill. mongelluzzo @ spglobal. com

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© 2025 S & P Global

Tariffs jeopardize US Southeast ports’ resin gains

By Michael Angell

While the Port of Houston still reigns as top gateway, resins shippers are increasingly tapping Southeast ports, thanks to their big-ship capacity and strong connectivity in east-west trades. However, President Donald Trump’ s tariff actions risk cutting into the steady growth of US resin exports and have virtually shut off US exporters largest market, China, given the buyer’ s 125 % retaliatory tariffs.

That’ s coming after a year of modest but steady growth; containerized US chemical and plastic resin exports expanded 1.2 % in 2024, the third consecutive annual

Chemical and resin exports steady after Q4 dip

Containerized US chemical product and plastic resin exports, in laden TEUs, with year-over-year change

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Source: PIERS, S & P Global

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increase and in line with the sector’ s five-year compound average growth of 2.1 %, according to PIERS, a sister company of the Journal of Commerce within S & P Global. Plastic resins, including polyethylene and polypropylene, represent 57 % of US chemical exports.

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© 2025 S & P Global

46 Journal of Commerce | May 5, 2025 www. joc. com