The past three years weren’t good for corn production, but 2013 has yielded a record 13.8 billion bushels and only half of it has yet been harvested. The weather hasn’t helped, varying from wet to dry, so in addition to dealing with an overabundance of crops, logistics is stressed with separating corn with differing levels…
Bangladesh, a major manufacturing hub of the garment industry supplying much of Europe, Asia, and North America with clothing, has been hit by a nationwide dock workers strike. Apparently, the workers were promised wage increases, but the money never came. The worst of the strike is centralized at Chittagong Port. Workers are also complaining about…
Amazon is already taking a substantial bite out of the retail world, commanding as much as 11 percent of total retail sales in some markets, according to Forbes. In fact, Amazon’s sales now total more than the next 12 internet retailers’ sales combined. Apparently, even adding e-commerce transactions to a retail website doesn’t help retailers…
For the second month in a row, the cost of importing goods rose in September by .2 percent. This follows a rise in August of .2 percent, which was revised after an originally projected flat month. These numbers, released by the Labor Department on Wednesday, Oct. 23 were delayed due to the recent government shutdown. Though…
During the recent government shutdown, many of the numbers industries and investors use to gauge the economy were not released due to worker furloughs. Now that operations have resumed, some of the data from September and early October have been released, and it’s clear that the shutdown did, in fact, have a negative effect on…
The new year didn’t ring in so merrily for Aldi and Lidl stores in Tesco Ireland, as the Food Safety Authority of Ireland discovers through DNA testing that beef burgers sold in some of these stores was, in fact, as much as 30 percent horse meat. Investigators have spent the rest of the year trying to…
Economists had expected the unemployment rate to drop to 335,000 last week, but instead the number of unemployed workers dropped to just 358,000, a reduction of 15,000. However, the statistics werent’ very clear, since the analysts had to adjust the figure for government workers applying for unemployment due to the government shutdown. Furthermore, a computer…
Staples, a global retailer of office supplies and equipment, has found the perfect niche for using electric trucks within their fleet of almost 2,000 delivery vehicles. According to Staples director of fleet equipment Mike Payette, the trucks are ideal for short local delivery routes within cities where lots of stops are involved. With a battery…
Following the 2011 earthquake and tsunami in Japan, automakers faced challenges getting enough parts to fulfill their vehicle orders. The technology industry also took a big hit, as so many of our electronics and electronics parts depend on Japanese manufacturers and suppliers. More recently, a South Korean company that manufacturers most of the world’s DRAM…
According to the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), out of the United States’ 600,000 bridges, one in nine is not in sufficient condition to handle current logistics routes. Recent bridge collapses in Washington state, Wisconsin, and Minnesota have shut down major trade thoroughfares, and the downgrading of some bridges in the state of Pennsylvania has…