News / Maritime and rail carriers need to be more collaborative, say shippers

Carriers need to become more collaborative partners in their customers’ supply chains and recognise that “it’s not all about transport”.

Director of the Global Shippers Forum James Hookham (pictured) told The Loadstar the experience gained during the pandemic had highlighted “a level of detachment” between, particularly maritime and rail, carriers and the needs of their customers.

“There is a question I’m receiving much more by shippers surrounding the myopic focus of their carrier partners that, in turn, affects their customers’ supply chains,” said Mr Hookham.

“Carriers think of their customers as ‘shippers’ and, thus, solely in the business of shipping, but their customers see carriers as one of many service providers they rely on to get their goods to market – but unlike other service providers, the carriers tend to be less collaborative.”

He said aviation had shown a much greater willingness to adapt to customer needs, and highlighted the changes that had been made to perishable and pharma transport methods as proof.

Furthermore, he said, shippers had become a lot more vocal about the regulatory exemptions afforded to carriers around competition policy, with many asking, “why we have to follow rules and they don’t?”.

“What we’re asking is for carriers to become a part of the supply chain, rather than being siloed-off service providers,” Mr Hookham explained.

“This means looking over the fence at other industries to see how they are meeting certain requirements. Take decarbonisation as an example, and look at how the automotive industry is achieving this, then take the lesson learned from that sector and apply it to transport.”