News

Two years for ports to prepare for 100% testing of all US-bound cargo

Freight associations have welcomed news that the US government has extended the deadline for foreign ports to commit to 100% container scanning by two years.

The US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said the reason was that senior DHS and Customs and Border Protection officials had acknowledged that most, if not all, foreign ports would be unable to meet the July 2012 target for scanning all US-bound cargo.

Christopher Snelling, head of global supply chain policy at the UK Freight Transport Association (FTA), said: "This is very good news, it's something we've been lobbying for, and we know our colleague organisations in the US have been lobbying for, on behalf of shippers.

"It was never reasonable to expect ports to be able to implement 100% scanning by 2012, and it would have caused all types of problems for the supply chain in terms of cost, and in terms of performance if ports don't have enough equipment."

Marco Sorgetti, director general of European forwarder association Clecat, said he would like the US government to go further.

He said: "We have always been against 100% scanning, so anything that puts it back is welcome.

"However, it is one thing to use instruments built into a legislation that allow you to delay it for two years and quite another to cancel it completely."

The British International Freight Association said the 9/11 Recommendations Implementation Act, designed to increase US security following the 11 September attacks and containing the scanning initiative, was widely regarded as draconian.

Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation chairman John Rockefeller said the government accountability office had released a report identifying the "overwhelming challenges" involved in implementing 100% scanning of maritime cargo.

"Without a better understanding of the feasibility of such a policy to international commerce and security, a mandate of global proportions was unquestionably well intended, yet premature."

The 100% scanning law will require any container bound for the US to be scanned for conventional - as well as radioactive and nuclear - threats before being loaded onto a vessel at a foreign port.

Written by Damian Brett and reproduced with kind permission of International Freighting Weekly