GSCW chat recap: Is the COVID-19 supply chain sustainable?

‘Container pandemic’ among most pressing shipping challenges

Alyssa Sporrer

4 years ago

This fireside chat recap is from Day 6 of FreightWaves Global Supply Chain Week. Day 6 focuses on global maritime.

FIRESIDE CHAT TOPIC: COVID Supply Chain: Is it sustainable?

DETAILS: Steve Ferreira, CEO at Ocean Audit, and Jon Monroe discuss how COVID-19 impacted shipping at the beginning of the pandemic, how current demand for freight is causing port congestion and when they expect things to go back to “normal.”

SPEAKER: Monroe, founder at Jon Monroe Consulting

BIO: In 1998, Monroe launched Jon Monroe Consulting with the belief that the supply chain was becoming too complex for most companies to manage on their own. Monroe has worked with NVOCCs, shippers, ports and technology companies to help streamline processes and improve results. Today, he represents one of the largest privately held NVOCCs in China and provides middleware solutions through SYSM, a cloud-based, proprietary purchase order management system that provides transparency into factories in Asia.

KEY QUOTES FROM MONROE

“We now have a container pandemic as well as a COVID-19 pandemic.”

“I think the ‘new norm’ is going to center around e-commerce, and it could flatten out the seasonalities that we have and raise the bar in terms of volumes.”