Supply Chain by the Numbers
   
 

-June 18 , 2010
   
 

This Week’s Supply Chain by the Numbers for June 18, 2010

   
 

Ocean Shipping Rates Riding Big Wave; Grocery Growth at WalMart; FedEx is Moving it Again; Say Goodbye to Low China Labor Costs

   
 
 
 

18.9%

The rise in just the past week in the Drewry trans-Pacific Container Rate Benchmark, amazingly reaching its highest level in the research and consulting firm’s five-year history of the trans-Pacific spot pricing index. The rate of $2,607 per 40-foot equivalent container unit for shipments from Hong Kong to Los Angeles for the week ended June 14 was sharply higher than the $2,193-per-FEU mark the week before.

 
 



 

51%

The amount of WalMart’s US revenue ($258 billion in 2009) that now comes from grocery sales, recently reported amid stories that showed some of WalMart’s grocery chain rivals have secretly been funding supposedly “grass roots” movements in local areas that work to keep WalMart stores from being approved in those locations.
 
 
7%

The rise in FedEx’s US ground shipments in its fiscal quarter just ended May 31 over the same period in 2009, a bullish sign for the economy. Volumes from China were up an amazing 41% in the quarter. Overall, revenue in the quarter was up 20% year over year. All this is may be bad news for shippers, providing an upward push on rates, but we’ll take that to get the economy fully back on track.
 
 
 
 
20%

Raise in the minimum wage recently in China’s Guandong province last month, as rapidly rising labor costs and recent labor activism there continue to make Western companies concern about production costs there. Overall, Chinese labor costs are up 5-15% already this year, according to estimates. (See Update - Labor Dynamics Continue to Change in China as Workers get Bold.)

 
 
 
 
 
 
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