Shipments from a US west coast terminal that handles almost 20 percent of the nation’s soybean meal exports have been curbed while damage from a crane collapse earlier this month is repaired, marking the latest setback to global trade flows.
A loading boom at farm cooperative Ag Processing Inc’s export facility in Aberdeen, Washington, fell on Sept. 1 as a bulk carrier was being loaded, said a person familiar with the matter and a shipping agent notice to customers seen by Bloomberg.
The damage could take months to repair, the notice said.
Photo: Reuters
Omaha, Nebraska-based Ag Processing declined to comment.
The disruption puts yet another kink in global supply chains, with the US still reeling from the export chaos caused by Hurricane Ida in the Gulf of Mexico, home of the US’ busiest agricultural port. The terminal in Grays Harbor handles the bulk of the US’ soy meal shipped to Asia from the west coast.
It is certain to put big importers such as the Philippines, which needs the product to feed livestock, in a bind just as soy processing slows in China as well.
Plants in a key region in China were ordered to shut down for at least a week as the Asian country contends with a severe energy crisis.
“The timing couldn’t have been worse,” said Jay O’Neil, proprietor of HJ O’Neil Commodity Consulting in Oregon. “This will dramatically impede US soybean meal exports.”
Soybean meal futures in Chicago have fallen 1.9 percent this month.
A ship waiting to load at Ag Processing’s facility when the crane collapse occurred was diverted to a grain terminal in Longview, Washington, operated by EGT LLC, the notice said.
The dock shutdown also affects exports of dried distillers grains, a byproduct of ethanol production that is a key ingredient in feed for beef cattle and dairy cows.
The US harvest season is beginning — a time when exports of soybeans and soy products typically increases.
AGP’s facility is especially important because soy meal is not as easily shipped from terminals focused on grains such as corn, as it flows differently and can cake up. The bulky commodity is also not meant to sit around.
“People hate to store meal,” O’Neil said. “It’s not something you can store for months.”
Other commodities:
‧Gold for December delivery rose US$1.90 to US$1,751.70 an ounce, posting a weekly increase of 0.02 percent.
‧Silver for December delivery fell US$0.25 to US$22.43 an ounce, up 0.4 percent from a week earlier, while December copper rose US$0.06 to US$4.29 a pound, rising 0.94 percent week-on-week.
China’s Huawei Technologies Co (華為) plans to start mass-producing its most advanced artificial intelligence (AI) chip in the first quarter of next year, even as it struggles to make enough chips due to US restrictions, two people familiar with the matter said. The telecoms conglomerate has sent samples of the Ascend 910C — its newest chip, meant to rival those made by US chipmaker Nvidia Corp — to some technology firms and started taking orders, the sources told Reuters. The 910C is being made by top Chinese contract chipmaker Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp (SMIC, 中芯) on its N+2 process, but a lack
NVIDIA PLATFORM: Hon Hai’s Mexican facility is to begin production early next year and a Taiwan site is to enter production next month, Nvidia wrote on its blog Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), the world’s biggest electronics manufacturer, yesterday said it is expanding production capacity of artificial intelligence (AI) servers based on Nvidia Corp’s Blackwell chips in Taiwan, the US and Mexico to cope with rising demand. Hon Hai’s new AI-enabled factories are to use Nvidia’s Omnivores platform to create 3D digital twins to plan and simulate automated production lines at a factory in Hsinchu, the company said in a statement. Nvidia’s Omnivores platform is for developing industrial AI simulation applications and helps bring facilities online faster. Hon Hai’s Mexican facility is to begin production early next year and the
Who would not want a social media audience that grows without new content? During the three years she paused production of her short do-it-yourself (DIY) farmer’s lifestyle videos, Chinese vlogger Li Ziqi (李子柒), 34, has seen her YouTube subscribers increase to 20.2 million from about 14 million. While YouTube is banned in China, her fan base there — although not the size of YouTube’s MrBeast, who has 330 million subscribers — is close to 100 million across the country’s social media platforms Douyin (抖音), Sina Weibo (新浪微博) and Xiaohongshu (小紅書). When Li finally released new videos last week — ending what has
AVIATION BOOM: CAL is to renew its passenger and cargo fleets starting next year on record profits as aviation continues to return to pre-pandemic levels China Airlines Ltd (CAL, 中華航空) yesterday said it is optimistic about next year’s business outlook, as the airline continues to renew its fleet on expectations that global passenger traffic would maintain steady growth and air cargo demand would remain strong. From next year to 2028, the airline is to welcome a new Boeing Co 787 fleet — 18 787-9 and six 787-10 passenger aircraft — to cover regional and medium to long-haul destinations, CAL chairman Hsieh Shih-chien (謝世謙) said at an investors’ conference in Taipei. The airline would also continue to introduce Airbus SE 321neo passenger planes and Boeing 777F cargo jets,
RSS