TMI Blog

I often use an analogy of being in the International Space Station when illustrating the pain the Heartland exporters suffer when competing in world markets. If you were to look out of the port window on station at night directly at the Heartland of the US you will see great clumps of light in a sea of darkness. All the imports go to those population centers represented by the great clumps of light and a good deal of the US exports come out of the darkness. This is true of Ag products as well as many manufactured and processed products from the Heartland. The pain comes from getting the empty inbound (import) equipment to the exporters without putting those exporters out of world markets through high transportation costs.

Ocean carriers have their reasons for wanting their equipment to turn as quickly as possible for the more profitable import traffic and the railroads who pay for a completely private infrastructure (which is very costly I might add) need to make a considerable profit to keep it up as well as replacing increasingly expensive updated and efficient equipment to handle the traffic.  Exporters understand much of this but as exports become more critical to this great nation we must find the balance in transportation to create opportunity and marketability for the Heartland exporters.

I look forward to using this blog as an opportunity to discuss the issues and possibly finding that balance for the Heartland exporters of all sizes.