John Gallagher (4:40)

Great. So, and more. More recently, FDA proposed a rule to establish additional traceability and record keeping requirements to food manufacturers, packers and processors. Now, while I understand this, this rule doesn't apply specifically to the carriers. Why might this be important for the carriers as well to know about?

Lowell Randall (5:06)

Yeah, I think it's a good point. And while the rule as it's proposed does specifically exclude transportation, it places significant responsibility on shippers and receivers that goes through what type of information needs to stay stay with product as it moves through all of these what they call critical tracking events. And since the carrier is involved in the origination of a load coming from a shipper and the destination at a receiver, I think it's really important for the carrier community to understand what their partners in the supply chain are going to be asked to do from a regulatory standpoint and to realize that whether it's a regulatory requirement or not, the private sector may ask of carriers some additional things to make sure that that traceability is intact. Whether it's something FDA requests or not. It may be something that a shipper or a receiver will work with their carrier partners on to ensure that that traceability is solid all the way through the supply, supply chain.

John Gallagher (6:23)

Great, great. I want to get into specific carriers here. And speaking of the trucking industry, industry in particular, and I know the trucking industry plays a big part for your members law. The American Trucking Associations just this, this week put out some economic statistics showing the difficulty that carriers are having hiring and hiring and, and retaining drivers in this market. So what challenges are your members seeing with respect to the truck availability or truck driver availability and how do you see any regulatory or legislative policy that can address this?

Lowell Randall (7:08)

Yeah, so this is an ongoing challenge. It was a problem a few years ago. The pandemic has only exacerbated it. So that is one of the top issues that I hear from members about is labor availability, whether that's drivers, warehouse workers, folks to work in a manufacturing plant. It is pervasive across really the whole economy. And so as a result, I think we've got to be creative as an industry, but we also can look to our policymakers for some of that creativity as well. One of the things that you may hear talked about is the Drive Safe act that would expand the potential driver pool to those individuals 18 to 21 and enable them to drive across state lines. Many states allow 18 year olds to get that commercial driver license, but currently federal law would prohibit them from going cross state lines. So we think that that's not a panacea, that's not going to solve the whole problem, but it's another tool in the toolbox. I think creative recruitment is another potential tool in the toolbox. You hear about apprenticeships and working with the Department of Labor. There are some things that are being done currently to try to transition, let's say veterans coming out of the military, active service, who have tremendous skills that can apply to the supply chain, whether that's in a driver mode or something else along the food supply chain. So I'm very much optimistic that we can find these kind of creative tools. Some of them are government driven, some of them are private sector driven to meet that burgeoning need. And I would just also say the pandemic and some of the unemployment benefits that were added to the mix over the pandemic, I think really made some additional challenges of getting people back into the workplace that may not have had as much an impact on the driver community, but I know in the warehousing community that was something that I heard a lot about. So as we're coming out of the pandemic, I'm hopeful that some of those stressors will be taken away and that things are going to start to loosen up in the labor market. But we know even historically that's going to continue to be an issue we have to pay close attention to.

John Gallagher (9:41)

Okay. And, and now moving a little bit more to maybe the maritime and rail side. I understand GCCA members, along with many US Exporters, have seen their operational costs rise as a result of the huge increase in demand for imports that led to demurrage and detention of containers, service disruptions at the ports, and also just big price increases from the ocean carriers. How would you like to see this issue dealt with from a regulatory perspective?

Lowell Randall (10:21)

It's such a big challenge and some of the problem is going to be very difficult to resolve in a regulatory context. But for example, we need to have more containers available. And as I talk to people in the container manufacturing sector, the orders are basically full for the rest of the year. So there's some things that you just. The private sector has to keep catch up with demand. But as we look at what the public sector can do you think about. You mentioned demurrage and detention. I think that's one area where our members in particular, particular have been disadvantaged by inappropriate application of demerge and detention when container availability backups at the ports, delays, and in some cases you maybe have an order for, let's say, 10 containers that are supposed to come on Monday. They don't come at all on Monday, but then you get 50 on Wednesday and you can't process 50. And there's a lot of inconsistency in how that's moving forward. But then you're still on the hook for demurrage and detention. So I would, I would say working with federal regulatory bodies to mitigate some of the inappropriate application of detention and demurrage. We've been working with the Surface Transportation Board over the last few years on this on the rail side, and they've recently issued a final rule that I think adds some balance to, to the demurrage policy realm. And we're hopeful that that will even the playing field a little bit more when it comes to the rail side. We're hoping that the Federal Maritime Commission can become even a little more active than they have been on the port side and the marine side to maybe mitigate some of the damages that we're seeing from a detention and demurrage standpoint there. So again, there's not a silver bullet and some of it is outside the government's control. But we need to all be working together through these challenging times. And that's across all of the parts of the food supply chain and the private sector, but also working with our government partners to try to ease these challenges as much as we can.

John Gallagher (12:45)

Yeah, and you might see some of that, you might see a little bit more proactive push from FMC now that the Biden administration has weighed in and is trying to put a little bit of force, justice force from the Justice Department behind that with that competition executive order that that was issued just recently. The so gcca. So getting into technology a little bit here, GCCA has talked about digitization, how that's improving the speed with which data is being transferred within the supply supply chain, which thereby gives shippers, which carriers and logistics companies a better handle on when and where to search product, which could help reduce things like panic buying, which we saw during the pandemic, early in the pandemic, but which could actually, you know, come up again as an issue. What role do you see the federal government playing, playing low in supporting this digitization trend?

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Lowell Randall (14:40)

Yeah. So digitization, whether it's blockchain or some of the other technologies that are that are emerging, I think can play an important role in the future of the food supply chain. And we need to work with the federal government to ensure that that information technology is continuing to be developed so that certainly there is a federal role in technology science and research development, but then also working with the private sector as those technologies come online, some regulations may lend themselves to adopting the technology. So you hear about the FDA's new era of smarter food safety and they are really relying a lot on technology and the role that it can play. The traceability rule that we've just talked about, technology can play an important role. So I would say again, a common theme you'll hear from me is we need to be communicating together. We need to be working together to address these issues and utilize technology as a tool, but it's only as good as the people who are using and administering it. So we need to have the right kind of framework and policy around that to ensure that the technology is used to, to the most efficient way.

John Gallagher (16:07)

Right, right. And the, the digitization trend is also kind of highlighting the vulnerable vulnerability in cybersecurity as well that companies have and that, you know, the meat processing company JBS is a big example of that. I mean, that's right. In your, your, your ballpark there. They were just recently hit with that ransomware attack. So I assume you're not, you wouldn't be advocating for more regulations from the federal government on cyber security, but on your members. But I mean, do you see, again, on the cybersecurity front, role for the government there?

Lowell Randall (16:46)

Yeah, so there are a couple of different roles. One is working with agencies like the Department of Homeland Security as they are developing resources that can assist industry in beating back cyber attacks and hardening their own systems. So I know that DHS has some good resources already available, but I think more can be done from an education and outreach standpoint where the technical experts and the cyber experts from agencies like DHS can do more outreach, particularly to critical infrastructure industries like the food sector. Then you've got agencies like those within the Department of Agriculture. When you see the JBS hit, they responded quickly and said, we're with the meat and poultry industry and put forward some suggestions and outreach to mitigate the impacts. So some of it is prevention and some of it is mitigation of impacts. I think there's a role for the government in both of those areas. And then we all have our own responsibility as folks in industry to use the best practices that are available to lessen the threat of cyber. And we know it's there. Many of our, several of our members over the last 12 months have been hit as well. And the food supply is something where, as we said, we're getting more and more reliant on technology. And so when you get a major player in the food supply chain that's hit, that has wide ramifications. So we have to stay vigilant.

John Gallagher (18:34)

Gotcha. And, and just briefly, before we wrap up law, I just want to ask you, you know, the Biden administration and Congress are working on a couple of infrastructure packages and trying to figure out how to pay for it. But just want to ask you, is there, is there anything in the infrastructure bills that you've seen so far that you're particularly keeping close eye on or concerned about?

Lowell Randall (18:57)

Well, I would say generally speaking, investments in infrastructure are something that we absolutely support. Roads, bridges, ports. So we need that type of investment, investments in things like rural broadband to follow on the technology side of things. So finding ways to make sure that our infrastructure is ready for the future, critically important from a concern standpoint, it's how do we pay for that and do we Are there ways to accomplish this without increasing taxes on an industry that has been working so hard to keep the food supply chain going through the pandemic? And I can attest that our members have been extremely busy, but that doesn't necessarily mean that it's been a good economic year for them. Labor costs have gone up, other costs have gone up, material costs, transportation costs, et cetera. And so at the end of the day, they may have been tremendously busy, but that doesn't mean that they got great economic benefit out of the pandemic. So by placing additional tax burdens on food industry right now, coming on the heels of the pandemic gives me great concern because I just, I know, I know the investments are important in infrastructure, but coming on the shoulders of an industry that has been pouring its heart and soul into keeping the food supply chain going over the last 18 months doesn't seem to be the right balance.

John Gallagher (20:42)

Okay, so we'll leave it there. Lowell, thank you again for joining us today and for your very valued regulatory perspective on the cold chain supply chains.

Lowell Randall (20:55)

Yeah, it's my pleasure. Thanks for the invitation and thank you.

John Gallagher (20:59)

Everyone for tuning in.