A Hanjin Shipping Co container vessel idled off the coast of Mexico after the company’s bankruptcy has received permission to dock and unload cargo at the Port of Long Beach, industry and union officials said Friday.
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Choi Eun-young, former chairwoman of Hanjin Shipping, earlier said she was willing to offer her private assets to help the shipper whose ships have been stranded at sea following its court receivership in South Korea earlier this month. Chief executive Gerry Wang said he was confident the South Korean government would provide sufficient funds to pay port operators and Seaspan by the time those ships arrived to ensure they were unloaded.
Hanjin’s parent company, Hanjin Group, planned to raise around $90 million to help cover the cost of unloading cargo, but the court said the amount was inadequate and that it wasn’t clear when that plan would be executed, Reuters reported last week.
A Hanjin Shipping Co ship is seen stranded outside the Port of Long Beach, California, September 8, 2016. Director Christian Sullivan explained that where Hanjin containers are stuck in port, Sullivan Shipping is working on finding alternate transport for the cargo destined for Malta.
Hanjin has been struggling to arrange financing to resume normal operations.
“It is being reviewed whether it is possible to secure the funding” from Korean Air, Financial Services Commission Chairman Yim Jong-yong said in a meeting with the ruling party.
Other nations have granted similar protections as Hanjin tries to keep afloat. Because of its global span, the Hanjin bankruptcy also threatens to take a long time to sort out. The Hanjin Greece is carrying “electronics, furniture, footwear and virtually anything a consumer would expect to find on the shelves leading up to the holiday season”, he said.
Hanjin’s woes were having wider knock-on effects.
141 – the number of ships Hanjin has (97 container ships, 44 bulk carriers).
Uncertainty about freight fees was leading to vast numbers of containers clogging warehouses at port terminals.
Hanjin California at Glebe Island dock under arrest with containers piled on board.
Sherwood repeatedly urged the parties to “self-help” and work out the problems as best they could.
However, exports of goods and services as a percentage of global gross domestic product have slipped in recent years to 29.3 percent in 2015 from 30.7 percent in 2012, according to data compiled by the World Bank. To retrieve a container from stacks at the docks, for example, some cargo handlers have to first set aside Hanjin’s empties, creating delays.
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The shipping line has filed for so-called U.S. Chapter 15 bankruptcy, which allows a company to seek recognition by U.S. courts of orders issued overseas.
