2016 will roll out several changes in transportation protocols, and every shipper needs to understand and prepare for the modifications. Current security challenges, along with an upcoming election year, mean that many additional changes are likely coming. Here at the top 5: 

In a recent blog, we stressed the importance of making the effort to become a "preferred shipper” to ensure equipment availability in a shrinking equipment market.  If you are a shipper relying on for-hire carriers, or a 3PL, you certainly should be aware of the looming issues conspiring to make it more expensive and more difficult to get your goods delivered. The one bright spot in the industry are falling fuel prices over the last 12 months. However, while this lone bit of positive news is certainly welcome, it will have little effect on the equipment availability issue that is spurred by several factors: a serious driver shortage, a lack of interest in young people to take on a driving career, ever-increasing government regulation and tightening capital markets. 

The U.S. trucking industry is pressuring Congress to allow men and women as young as 18 to drive 80,000 pound commercial trucks inter-state on U.S. highways. Federal regulations currently require that drivers be at least 21 before they can drive commercial trucks across state lines. This plan, before the Senate, and is part of highway legislation and would greatly increase the number of teenagers behind the wheel of big rigs. The pressure and importance of this issue is in response to the continuing driver shortage.

New rules governing the transportation and distribution of food began to take effect in June this year. There is profound concern among industry experts that many food haulers still are not ready to implement these new rules. During a panel discussion at the 2015 Mid-America Trucking Show in Louisville, Kentucky, lack of carrier preparedness was a major concern. Contamination incidents and outbreaks of food borne illness have a significant impact on public health.

The North American trucking industry is a roughly $700 billion-a-year market, and yet its use of technology does not reflect that capitalization. This is especially evident in the way shippers and logistics services providers manage their freight with the thousands of LTL and Truckload carriers operating today. Even in today's technology boom, the majority of shippers still don’t use Transportation Management Systems (TMS) to automate the planning and execution of their domestic freight shipments. Utilizing a transportation management system to manage domestic freight shipments can measurably increase your efficiency.  In this article we'll examine the benefits of using a TMS for things like carrier selection, visibility and freight spend reduction. Our source material will be a study, conducted by American Shipper between mid-August and mid-September, which incorporates feedback from 190 shippers and LSPs, as well as 21 domestic trucking carriers about their perspectives on domestic transportation management systems. The impact of this study is to understand why shippers and Logistics Service Providers use a TMS system and the benefits derived from such systems.

As we as consumers all know, e-commerce is a huge and vital part of the retail industry in 2015. How do the outlooks on e-commerce differ or align between some of the top retail giants in the nation?

Today's supply chains are under enormous pressure to manage their supply chain faster and more efficiently. Technology officers are looking to applications to meet efficiency demands from both customers and management. The rate at which technology is expanding its capabilities seems to make what was an impossible idea just a few short years ago now a plausible solution.

The inaccuracy of cargo containers, as well as individual skids, gaylords and crates, is a major safety issue that shippers need to be aware of. Generally, freight cost is directly related to weight.  It is not unusual for shippers to innocently estimate the weight of a particular shipment below the actual.  For example, it is very common for shippers to calculate their shipment size from their product data and neglect to include the weight of the shipping packaging.  Usually, a benign issue but multiplied by several shipments per container the bulk shipment could be significantly overweight causing unsafe trucks, ocean vessels and airplanes.  The safety issues are significant; reduced braking distance for a truck, buoyancy issues for a sea going vessel and lift problems for an airplane.  Most carriers have an entire department to re-weigh freight and confirm their NMFC classification to ensure a transportation vessel is safely loaded. 

In 2015, China devalued the Yuan nearly 2% hoping to stimulate growth and exports.  This year, the currency is down 2.9 percent versus the dollar. Purchasers of Chinese exports are enjoying lower net prices when buying in dollars. 

Unmanned aerial vehicles, also known as drones, are becoming extremely popular. The unmanned drone industry is expected to create more than 100,000 U.S. jobs by 2025. The economic impact could approach 100 billion within the next decade according to a study prepared for the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International. Future aeronautical engineers will need to be trained in everything from computer software development to engineering, manufacturing and piloting skills. Commercial drones do have their limitations. Currently an average drone can reach speeds of 50 miles per hour and carry up to 5-7 pounds, limiting drones delivery to small parcels.