News

New labor contract provides certainty to exporters

Members of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union have ratified its new port labor contract. Dan Halstrom, president and CEO of the US Meat Export Federation says the contract brings certainty to exporters. 

“We will not run the risk of any kind of disruption from a labor standpoint,” he says. “This is really good news and we can move forward, especially with our high value chilled business that primarily goes off of the West Coast.”

Halstrom says throughout the contract negotiations and work stoppages West Coast ports lost some business to the East and Gulf Coasts.  “Hopefully, Long Beach, and Oakland, and these key export ports for us can regain some of that business,” he says.  “And have a larger array of options from a schedule standpoint into some of our key markets like Japan and Korea.”

The six-year agreement is retroactive to July 1, 2022 and will run through July 1, 2028.