Borderlands is a weekly rundown of developments in the world of U.S.-Mexico cross-border trucking and trade. This week: Mexico remains top US trade partner in August, Laredo No. 1 gateway; Eden Green begins $40M vertical farming expansion near Dallas; Production, exports of Mexican-built trucks fall for second straight month; and Port of Brownsville receives $11.5M to overhaul cargo dock.
For the fourth consecutive month, Mexico was the No. 1 trading partner of the U.S., totaling $70.8 billion in August.
It’s the seventh time in the past eight months that Mexico ranked No. 1, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
During August, Canada ranked No. 2 at $66.2 billion in trade, while China ranked third at $47.5 billion.
Mexico’s trade with the U.S. was $532.7 billion through the first eight months of 2023, a year-over-year (y/y) increase of 2.4% from the same period in 2022, according to a WorldCity analysis of Census Bureau data.
Laredo, Texas, retained the No. 1 spot among the nation’s 450 international gateways for trade in August with $28.6 billion, according to WorldCity. It was the seventh straight month the Laredo border crossing was the country’s top-ranked international commercial trade port.
The Port of Los Angeles ranked No. 2 with $27.1 billion and Chicago O’Hare International Airport was No. 3 , reporting $25.4 billion in trade.
The top 3 imports from Mexico to the U.S. through Laredo in August were auto parts ($2.4 billion), passenger vehicles ($1.3 billion) and commercial trucks ($1 million).
The top exports from the U.S. to Mexico were auto parts ($1.5 billion), gasoline ($326 million) and diesel engines ($272 million).
Since 2018, truckload demand has nearly doubled out of the Laredo port of entry, which includes the World Trade Bridge and the Colombia Solidarity Bridge. FreightWaves’ SONAR platform shows that Laredo’s outbound tender market share (OTMS.LRD) is currently 0.566% of the overall freight market, compared to 0.321% in 2018.
The Outbound Tender Market Share index measures the percentage of outbound tenders relative to all the other 135 markets in the U.S.
While Laredo’s current value may be low compared to other markets, FreightWaves market expert Zach Strickland recently wrote, “the rising trend is more important than the current value in this situation.”
“Truckload demand has nearly doubled out of the border town Texas markets of Laredo and McAllen since 2018,” Strickland said. “Phoenix has experienced a similar developmental boom, becoming a proxy for California’s old warehousing capital in Southern California’s Inland Empire. This shifting demand pattern is changing transportation networks and will subsequently impact future pricing structures.”
Source: Yahoo News
