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The latest figures released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics show that 105,237 people in Australia are experiencing homelessness, with 60% of those under the age of 35. Perhaps surprising to many people is that 44% of these are women, 13% are under the age of 12. These figures in a lucky country like Australia are disgraceful.
On 23 June 2016 I will join with Brisbane’s community leaders and CEOs to spend one night on the streets as part of the Vinnies CEO Sleepout. We will experience homeless life in an endeavour to raise awareness and crucial funds for St Vincent’s homeless services.
Last year I raised $1,520.00 through donations from clients, suppliers, family and friends. This year I am aiming to better this amount and hope you will join with me to do so. Please click here to sponsor me and donate to support this great cause.
Thank you!
My team and I at Depth Logistics always give our clients comprehensive and fully transparent quotes that they can reliably budget on. This is a non-negotiable thing for us.
That being said, increasingly we are competing against operators who are at best convenient in how they present their quotations, or at worst, plainly try to mislead shippers about the true landed costs just to secure the booking.
One trick we see nearly every day relates to Australian Customs and Quarantine import charges charges which are published on government websites. Specifically EEC(Electronic Entry Charges) and DAWR(Dept of Agriculture and Water Resources) entry and inspection fees.
Unscrupulous freight forwarders will not quote these actual charges in dollar terms to a client as if they did it increases their quotation per shipment by sometimes A$2-300.00+ depending on the cargo type and import declarations required. Instead they say things like "Plus government charges" or "Plus EEC and DAWR fees" if the client is lucky.
Price is an important driver of most clients decisions as to who they trust to move their cargo. When they are making their decision they innocently compare quotes where a professional forwarder actual identifies the exact costs, because you can, against another operator who intentionally is vague(Plus Govt charges). They total the various dollar amounts listed in the quotes and compare who is the most competitive.
It is not until they get billed and find that these charges were not identified specifically in the original quotation that they realise they have actually paid too much overall.
To make matters worse operators who do this usually add EEC onto the import duty and GST on their invoice to disguise the charges further which they know will often go unnoticed by the client. If they get found out and queried later they hide behind "But our quote said Plus Govt charges" and the poor client is snookered.
So be aware of this freight forwarders quotation trick and insist that whoever you get quotations from always identifies all charges in dollar terms so you can compare apples with apples.
If you need any further clarification or want to check what you might have been billed previously, I'd be pleased to help.
+Brad Skelton
The larger container ships can now carry up to 19000+ 20' containers!
The economies of scale and lower fuel costs are driving rates down. Please contact me if you want to check if what you are paying now is at current market levels.
All for now,
+Brad Skelton
The local economy in Queensland is currently hurting badly as coal miners falter with coal prices having fallen more than 60% over the last five years. Majors such as US owned Peabody Energy are going into administration or Chapter 11 which is threatening thousands of jobs in mines they operate here.
In November 2015 the OECD agreed to restrict coal fired power stations being financed by government while about two years earlier the World Bank also decided that they would only provide finance for coal in rare circumstances. These types positions are driven by the fact that environmentally coal is a dirty energy source compared to others such as gas, solar wind and nuclear. Nobody could logically argue against this.
Despite this there are some inescapable facts about coal that means it still will be a massive energy source for the world for many years to come.
These are:
-It is still the cheapest source of fuel for base load electricity and currently accounts for about 40% of global electricity supply. Huge!
-In the third world coal demand is still growing as the need for electricity rapidly grows with urbanisation in countries such as India and China.
-While demand for coal in developed countries is decreasing the global demand overall is still growing.
-For the third world, coal is also a source of energy that is safely, easily and cheaply transported and stored. You can literally pile it up in heaps in a yard whereas gas for example needs extremely expensive infrastructure that these nations struggle to afford.
McKinsey & Co forecast that despite the boom in renewable energy fossil fuels like coal and gas will still be the dominant source of energy. Their forecast is that by 2040 renewable energy sources will only contribute about 17% to global energy needs and coal will still be meeting 31% of demand.
Inevitably coal prices will recover and could do so quite spectacularly from where they are now in my view. Clearly demand will be strong for the next few decades while at the same time the supply side will reduce with action the World Bank, OECD and green groups are taking.
Therefore shares in low cost miners of thermal coal look like pretty good buying at the moment if you adopt a long term view.
All for now,
+Brad Skelton
Depth Commodities
