Young Freight Forwarder of the Year 2009

Ms. Jalinda Hartigan, a young bright enthusiastic person with a desire to achieve and in a short period of time working for Globelink, she has grown and has taken on more responsibilities now handling our exports as an operator for Melbourne/Brisbane/Fremantle & Adelaide. She was nominated by the Managing Director of Globelink Australia , Ms. Jacqui Mc. Combie to participate in the Young Freight Forwarder of the Year 2009 & won the award with the required essay topic “The Implications for the Forwarding Industry of the Global Economic Situation”.

On behalf of the Globelink Family, we would like to congratulate Jalinda on her achievement & best wishes for the future.

My Name is Jalinda Hartigan; I am 20 years of age and have worked for Globelink International Pty Ltd since the last quarter of 2007. Entering into this field was due to a family friend being passionate about the industry so I did some research and then was fortunate enough to get a traineeship with Globelink and started my career in International Freight Forwarding.

We are an NVOCC, which means Non Vessel Operating Common Carrier in simple terms we do not own our own vessels, Globelink is a Wholesaler to the Freight Forwarding industry and my role is to operate our Exports and deal with all the freight forwarders booking LCL cargo, as being a wholesaler we pack numerous lines of cargo into one container. This morning I came to work around 8 o'clock in the morning started up my computer and read my E-Mails. I had a staggering 100 plus emails which should get me excited with the prospect of so much work. However, the next 40 odd emails informed of 2 lottery wins, a sweepstakes win, several “long lost relatives” willing to share a fortune with me and numerous online pharmacies with discounted products.

Unfortunately they were all spam or Internet scam e-mails and therefore not real, in fact that there were very few “real” e-mails with bookings for new export jobs. Over the past 18 months I have been used to receiving numerous fresh bookings each morning. However, in the past 12 months the numbers of bookings have slowed down dramatically and yet, I've still been busy. What I find very sad is that over my time in the industry I've noticed more and more, due to the economics, companies are not picking up the phone to talk to you anymore but using other devices such as email and fax. This coupled with the cut backs in staff have shown me that our industry is feeling the impact as no one has any time to say “Hello How are you?” any longer.

When I first commenced work in the Export department, the days went exceptionally fast. The e-mail bookings never stopped, the phone calls were continuous and we barely stopped for lunch and quite often worked a bit later to make sure all clients were given good service. The employees felt pressure from being very busy.

Now we have time to do our filing, have regular lunch breaks and finish the day on time, the security of your job is always on your mind and for me making sure that I find different way to maintain my clients and assist them as much as possible to secure my position within the company. Ultimately Globelink's services are an extension to our clients.

Being involved with International Trade, we have probably noticed the impact of the global economic recession quicker and in different ways to the average person on the street, I read the financial section of the papers and of course all the media in relation to our recession and they all patronize how great the drop in the Australian Dollar exchange rate is for improving exports. However, what they fail to talk about is the immediate impact of course hits our commodities as they become more attractive to overseas buyers.

On the other hand, in the freight forwarding industry our basis for existence is not in commodities. We rely on all the small to medium business who don't either have export departments and use a forwarder so the effect for my company is forwarders still receiving bookings to pass down to us as the wholesaler. From talking with clients regarding the drop in our traffic they have all stated that with the drop in the dollar, whilst it is great, it takes time to redevelop with overseas and get their products back in to these markets.

The drop in the oil prices has also impacted our export market easing the BAF on freight rates which was substantial only months ago however; in the 4th quarter of 20008 it increased rapidly and now it is decreasing at a much slower speed. All these factors show and should be determining an increase in exports. The logic seems OK to me, our export goods should cost less to the overseas buyers so Australia should be selling more goods to the overseas market which should make me busier.

From talking to my regular Forwarding clients the reality is a much different story. The recession has hit many of Australia 's overseas export markets earlier and harder than here in Australia . So even though the goods are cheaper, the overseas manufacturers no longer have the demand for their goods. In simple terms if they can't sell the goods, they stop manufacturing the goods so they stop buying our raw materials, or stop buying finished products from Australia .

This slowdown is affecting the entire Australian Freight Forwarding Industry. We are now faced with the retail forwarders all begging for reduction in rates as they struggle to make profits in their respective businesses.

Some of these forwarders have had retrenchments and have remaining staff working on a 4 day week. As the only genuine Wholesale Forwarder in the market Globelink has had to look at ways to sustain services to the industry. After doing our own figures for exports and looking at our own markets and what has been affected not only in volume but also in profit which clearly shows in areas like:- New Zealand USA Europe Hong Kong Taiwan and Korea

These markets have taken the biggest hits in being able to offer a regular console service to our clients and we are finding all our competitors have experienced the same in trying to make regular boxes. This has driven Globelink to look at ways of still servicing our clients and giving them fast transits.

We have looked at ways to drive forward in our shrinking market by:-

1) Offering services via Singapore/Port Kelang as hub ports for transshipment to regions which we would normally be packing direct containers to:-

2) Get our Head Office in Singapore involved to offer us the best transshipment rates possible to hold the competitiveness within the market

3) Reduce rates dramatically in the industry to offset not being able to pack direct and hold business

4) We trialed this in Brisbane/Fremantle/Adelaide prior to offering in markets in Sydney and Melbourne to ensure we did not loose market share

5) Putting a comprehensive world wide export tariff together and having a long validity on this to secure business

6) Targeting larger tenders and then having to sell them on a new concept till the market improves

7) Learning to knock back cargo or move to the following week's vessels so we don't open a box to move cargo making losses.

By researching our markets and talking to clients they are all in the same boat as us and the main concern is to ensure they are not changing vessels on their clients so this was a major concern to us in implementing a new way of doing business to what we have been selling in the market place. From discussing with sales and management this has not been easy to change client's minds round from only having a direct service but we are making progress and it is all looking very positive for the coming year.

As my expertise is in exports I decided to get a full look at the economic environment in the Freight Forwarding Industry to have a better understanding of what we are dealing with over the coming year. I decided to talk with our Import departments both in Sydney and Melbourne along with discussions with some major import accounts of ours to get an overview of the economic position for both our import and export markets in Australia .

From talking with my colleagues, Imports have also been greatly affected; Australian companies are bringing in less stock. In fact instead of bringing FCL's with a month or two of stock, many companies are now bringing in LCL cargo simply to satisfy orders already placed.

The overview of the import market from media is imports from our major trading partner China is down by more than 30%. This is causing a bit of chaos in the market with vessels omitting ports and vessels coming into Australia part empty.

In talking to shipping lines they have advised that for the first time in years they have had to reposition containers into Australia to supply their export demand and 20' containers are of the utmost concern going forward.

Australia is coming into the peak time for exports with commodities (such as cotton, grain, minerals etc) and a lot require specialize equipment like food quality boxes. Due to weight constraints they require 20' boxes rather than 40's so it leaves the shipping line no choice but to reposition boxes on vessels into Australia to meet the demand for the export market.

Since our business in based on FAK's and not FCL traffic we believe our FAK's in volume should be increasing however even with the ocean freight rates in the market being at such low levels we are not seeing a huge growth in this market so far this year. Going forward, we have been advised of overseas LCL rates in the market running at negative which of course ultimately means the consignee will have to pay higher locals again pushing them to look at which is the cheaper move for them, LCL or FCL. This is a huge concern to all in the market as no one can predict what will be the outcome.

The shipping line omitting ports of call can affect Australian exports as they aren't necessarily calling all ports where they were previously. This in turn starts pushing vessels out and delaying cargo which of course is a concern. Now with the new fight for cargo in the market you cannot afford for shipping lines to continually change their vessels.

Shipping Lines have been talking about the fact that over the past 10 years they have endeavored to bring larger vessels into Australia to cover the share volume of imports now they are struggling to fill vessels and with lower rates we could even see shipping lines closing down or merging which will result in tighter competition and not as many options for the forwarding market. This could ultimately hurt the smaller forwarders and really bring our industry down over the past decade the Freight Forwarding Industry has been well known for its fast growth; in 2009 we are starting to see the effects of the Economic Downturn in the industry.

This down turn has changed our market very quickly in all facets from employment, to work load as I mentioned earlier we are now not working the long hours and have time to enjoy lunch. This is something that whilst good is also concerning at the same time as you never know how long can businesses hold up before drastic measures have to again take place. As I talk to a lot of forwarders there is a lot of nervous staff out there, not sure what one day will bring to the next.

I believe even though I've only been in the industry for a short time that if you stick to what you are good at and work with all elements in the industry you will survive and will come out of this down turn better off. I also believe ethics of staff and appreciation for jobs will be a bonus as the industry was renowned for staff constantly moving from one employer to the next.

The key in this economic environment is to use this time to regroup and do what you do better and give back the support to clients to ensure they are achieving there own targets and goals to increase our business at the end of the day.

I still enjoy being in the industry and now I face the challenge to develop and grow not only myself but to ensure the growth and stability of my employer. In this Global Economic Situation there will always be a need for Freight Forwarders in our industry and I love the old saying “When the going gets tough, the tough gets going” .