Boston To Beijing: Maritime Strategy Now

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Another week, another maritime strategy that
we're talking about.
But this time we're jetting backand forth in our discussion from
Boston to Beijing.
Here in Massachusetts, thesecond annual Massachusetts
Maritime Strategy Conferencebrought together federal, state,
and industry leaders for a dayfull of coordination,
innovation, and shipboardcelebration.

(00:38):
And in Washington, todayactually marks a comment
deadline for suspending Section301 China port fees.
Did you know that there was acomment section or a comment
period for this?
It was a short comment period.
Two different rooms, one cleartheme.
Maritime strength comes fromstrategy.
We're going to continue to breakit all down.
Hi, welcome back to By Land andby Sea, an attorney breaking

(01:00):
down the weekend supply chain,presented by me, the Maritime
Professor.
I'm Lauren Beegan, founder ofthe Maritime Professor, former
FMC International AffairsAttorney, and founder of Skull
Strategies.
By Land and By Sea is your go-toresource for navigating the
regulatory side of global oceanshipping.
And me, I'm your favoritemaritime attorney.
As always, this podcast is foreducational purposes only and

(01:23):
should not be considered legaladvice.
There's no attorney clientprivilege created by this video
or this podcast.
If you need an attorney, contactan attorney.
So let's get into it because asyou know, ocean shipping moves
the world.
All right.
Segment one, story of the week,this first story.
This week, maritime stakeholdersof Massachusetts, Rhode Island,

(01:44):
and beyond, coming from DC, allover the all over the country,
actually, gathered atMassachusetts Maritime Academy
in Buzzards Bay for the secondannual Massachusetts Maritime
Strategy Conference,Massachusetts Maritime Strategy
Summit, we were calling itsometimes.
It was the strongest showingyet.
I had the privilege of helpingto plan and moderate some of the

(02:04):
events.
And this year's focus was clearaligning Massachusetts with a
growing number of states.
We have Washington State,Michigan, Louisiana, I think
Texas, Florida.
Look, there's a lot ofstate-based maritime strategies
in one form or another that arecoming together.

(02:25):
And Massachusetts is part ofthat.
From the opening remarks, theenergy was unmistakable.
This wasn't just a static policymeeting.
This was an active workshop.
This was a conversation abouthow Massachusetts and the
surrounding areas can help leadthe conversation in what the
priorities are in these statesand these Commonwealths.

(02:47):
We started the morning with afederal panel.
It had former FMC CommissionerBill Doyle.
We had former rear admiral,retired rear admiral John Mauger
of the U.S.
Coast Guard.
We had Bill Golden, formerMassachusetts representative,
now focused on maritimefinancing, and myself.
Together, we all explored howfederal programs and state

(03:07):
priorities can align tostrengthen the maritime sector.
We talked about infrastructurefunding, shipyard
revitalization, some of thesignals that we're seeing out of
DC that may benefit states andCommonwealths.
It was a fantastic conversationwith a lot of insights on things
to be paying attention to.
Things that we often talk abouton this podcast, anyways.

(03:29):
And then after federal came theMassachusetts panel, it looked
inward.
How do we organize acrossagencies, ports, and educational
institutions to support thisindustry that we already have,
that we have had for quite along time.
And how do we prepare for what'snext?
Leaders discuss regionalcoordination, workforce

(03:49):
pipelines, integrating maritimepolicy with economic
development.
It was a great conversation aswell.
Then we moved into our keynotespeaker.
Bill Joyle joined again.
He returned to the stage todeliver powerful updates on what
he's hearing from DC.
He covered federal maritimeinvestments, port modernization,
MARA ed programs, and the bigpicture shift towards a more

(04:11):
resilient U.S.
maritime industrial base, oftentalking about some of the
components that we're seeingcome out of the Ships Act.
After lunch, then we shiftedgears and we went into a
moderated brainstorming session.
Now, this might have been trulythe most dynamic part of the
day.
The floor was open to the fullaudience.
We had port directors, mariners,shipyard executives, educators,

(04:34):
ship repair facilities.
We had everything in the room.
Not everyone exactly, but we hadcore priorities identified by
those that were in the room onwhat a Massachusetts maritime
strategy could and perhapsshould include.
The ideas came pouring in duringthis brainstorming session.
They were creative, they wereambitious, they were rooted in

(04:57):
some of the real industry needsthat we have out there.
We had great, great ideas, likestatewide campaigns.
I mean, think YouTube channel.
I don't know if you ever saw iceroad truckers, but I did in the
90s, right?
I think it was Discovery Channelor something.
I know a lot about ice roadtrucking.
I probably will never be an iceroad trucker myself, but I know

(05:18):
a lot about it.
Perhaps the maritime industryneeds something like that.
We were actually showing videosof colleagues that we know,
mariners out there, and some ofthe cool things that they get to
see while they're out at sea.
Wouldn't that be cool to havethat in a YouTube channel?
We'll see, we'll see.
That was one of the cool ideas.
Also, there's a lot of talk withthese state-based maritime

(05:39):
strategies about perhapsoffices, maritime-specific
offices within state houses,perhaps Office of Maritime
Affairs, maritime shipbuilding,something that's not just a
subcategory of a state DOT, butperhaps an actual dedicated
maritime office to ensure thesemaritime issues have direct

(06:00):
coordinated voice among thestate policy.
We'll see.
There were also calls forperhaps financial incentives
targeting maritime industries,kind of mirroring some of these
federal pushes and federalideas.
One that I keep hearing isperhaps no income tax on
mariners.
Perhaps maybe there's somethingthere at the state level to

(06:21):
support ship repair or othercyclical maritime jobs that
experience long layoff periodsbetween contracts.
That was one of the examplesbrought up during that
discussion.
And that's exactly why theseconversations matter, right?
These are quick, clear, perhapscheat sheets of what each state
has to offer, these state-basedinitiatives for maritime

(06:42):
strategies.
Because when federal funding isready, and if it needs a place
to go, knowing what we alreadyhave, I keep calling them these
menus of what the state has tooffer, maritime menus.
What we already have to offer islikely more than half the battle
of figuring out where it needsto go, right?
A perfect example actually justpopped up right before I was

(07:03):
coming on live today from theBoston Ship Repair.
They posted a photo of their drydock with a message saying, our
docks, our docks have been stillfor two months now.
And our team, some of the bestship repair professionals
anywhere, are eager to get backto work.
And the message then taggedMered and Military Sea Lift
Command and Navse, NSWC, andNewarick.

(07:25):
And then it followed up with ifyou've got hulls that need work,
we've got the people, theskills, and the space to make it
happen.
Let's get this yard movingagain.
Now, this struck me, yes, weshould have our maritime
industries compete.
Yes, we absolutely should.
But we shouldn't have shiprepair yards sit idle,
especially in a time when we arefocusing on maritime dominance

(07:48):
and maritime resilience andmaritime becoming a large
industry again and theindustrial base being well
supported.
How can a business sustain if wedon't have vessels in a repair
yard?
If we we need to get there,right?
But we need to keep thesebusinesses busy.
And if this is a priority of theadministration, we have to get

(08:09):
to work before we lose theselocations.
And I think that speaks to thelarger point too.
How do we keep talented shipyardemployees in this industry if
they're sitting idle or facinglayoffs for months at a time?
And even when they are working,perhaps like in Boston, they're
sometimes fighting traffic justto get into the city to reach

(08:30):
the yard.
Look, one thing's for sure here,we have to get this industry
busy.
We have to get this industrybusy if we want it to have
lasting power.
And we have to get places likeBoston Ship Repair some ships to
repair, right?
This is what state-basedmaritime strategy is all about.
This is also what the nationalmaritime strategy is all about.
This week was Maritime ActionPlan Day.

(08:51):
And I will give a littledeference here.
We are in a government shutdown.
I can only imagine that we don'thave the same manpower that we
would have otherwise to get themaritime action plan out.
But November 5th was happymaritime action plan day.
I'm hoping we get something thismonth.
We'll see.
I keep, we'll see.
I keep just having this feelingthat maybe something by the end

(09:11):
of the month or in the next fewweeks, but we'll see.
I know that there it everythingtakes reviews, right?
But that's part of what all ofthis is about, right?
Both the state-based maritimestrategies and these national
and a potential nationalmaritime strategy may be coming
from this maritime action plan.
We need coordination, we needvisibility and readiness so that
when opportunity is ready, whenthe infrastructure and the

(09:35):
workforce are ready to answer,when the dollars are ready, we
have, we need to make sure theinfrastructure is there and we
and the workforce is ready.
We need to grow that workforce.
But by growing it, we need tomake sure that the current
workforce we have is busy,right?
The final panel brought it alltogether again with a look
ahead, perhaps.
It was a tech AI future maritimepanel, and the discussion

(09:58):
explored AI, digital innovationimports, on the water, digital
innovation and AI in the vessel,and discussing how technology
will reshape both operations andworkforce needs in the next
decade.
It was the perfect note to endon, forward-looking and
ambitious.
And then we stepped out onto thepier, and this was kind of fun.

(10:19):
We had a tour of the brand newnational security multi-mission
vessel, this these NSMV vessels.
You may recall that I went andgot to see the christening of
the state of Maine.
Now, this was the vessel givento Massachusetts Maritime
Academy.
This was the training shipPatriot State.
It was the NFM V vessel given toMass Maritime.

(10:41):
And it was cool, guys.
It was cool.
They had a whole bridge that wasfor operations, and then they
had a whole bridge that was fortraining.
So you could actually feel likeyou were navigating without
overburdening the actual peoplewho were driving the vessel, but

(11:01):
you could kind of mirror andmimic on just one floor down.
It was cool.
Like it still had thatunmistakable new ship smell.
And I'm not telling you I knowmuch or or I have smelled many
brand new vessels going out, butit smelled like fresh paint.
It smelled like fresh rubber.
It smelled like clean steel.
Look, seeing the next generationof training capability up close

(11:23):
was so exciting and really areminder of what investment in
maritime really looks like.
This has been a good idea for along time, right?
This this VCM, this vesselconstruction manager NSMV
project is not new.
It did not get stood up sixmonths ago, but it is worth
celebrating and worthy ofcelebration and important to

(11:45):
celebrate because it is a goodidea that's gone well.
And these are fantastic vesselsthat were made for training,
that were made for the nextround of mariners out there, but
are also able to be uplifted intimes of need.
Look, we wrap the day with thismix-and-mingle happy hour during
the vessel tours, rightalongside the vessel tours.

(12:06):
It was an informal chance todebrief trade cards and keep
that conversation going.
Look, initial readouts of thisconference were that it was so
fun, such a success, and it'salready getting everybody's
wheels turning on whatMassachusetts maritime strategy
should and could look like, buthow it aligns at the state,
regional, and national level.

(12:26):
Look, the momentum is going.
We plan to do this again nextyear.
If you're interested, reach out.
We'd love to have you at thethird annual Massachusetts
Maritime Strategy Conference.
We're looking at November 12thwith maybe a golf tournament.
Apparently, there were about 12maritime stakeholders that all
got together the day before thisconference and went golfing.
So maybe we'll have a golftournament with it.
But this one's becoming a can'tmiss event.

(12:49):
We'd love to see you next year.
All right.
The second thing that I wantedto cover was the Section 301
maritime suspension.
If you caught my interview lastweek with Sal Marcagliana, we
had just heard that they werepausing the vessel and the port
fees, but we didn't know muchabout it.
We didn't know, you know, it wasa handshake agreement, but we
still needed to see what USCR'sproposal was for it.

(13:09):
So today, November 7th, is thecommon deadline for the US trade
representative's proposal tosuspend for one year, right?
This came from November 1st whenTrump made the agreement with
President Xi of China that theywould be delaying by one year
the Section 301 port and vesselfees.

(13:29):
Remember, this is targetingChina's shipbuilding and the
dominance that they have there.
Earlier this year, the U.S.
imposed fees on China built,China-operated vessels, calling
it U.S.
ports, citing China's efforts todominate the global maritime
supply chain.
Then, like we know, the WhiteHouse announced a Trump-Shi
economic deal directing USTR topropose a one-year suspension.

(13:51):
And that was the key part here.
It directed USTR to propose thisone-year suspension of those
measures.
And everything kept saying thatthis was going to be for
November 10th.
And so here we are, we're notquite at November 10th.
So the fees are still in place.
We are still collecting fundsoff of China-built or
China-operated vessels callingit US ports for another three

(14:13):
days.
So it needed to go to the USTRto have a comment period.
And so that's what we saw isjust yesterday on the 6th, and
word is I guess it came outaround noon, that there was a
call for comments.
And so the deadline is actuallytoday, 5 p.m.
We're we're just about there forcomments to be filed, request

(14:34):
for comments for suspendingSection 301 action for one year.
Look, sometimes late commentsare accepted.
But I if you have in the nextlittle bit, send over your
comments.
Last check, there were about 50comments that had actually been
filed.
I don't think that this is goingto be too contentious.
I think that this is going to besomething that is kind of a

(14:56):
procedural, you know, this willdelay for the next year.
But however, I think that thisis interesting because what I
saw in these first just under amonth that these fees have been
open, most shippers neveractually saw these fees being
passed on.
The cost burden was largelyabsorbed by the vessel owners

(15:18):
and operators themselves,particularly right, those
directly assessed and having thehigher fees.
So, right, Costco and OCL werein some of the trade presses
having some of the larger feeswith their port, with their US
port calls.
And sure there were there were afew others as well.
It wasn't just Costco and OCL,but those were the ones that we

(15:39):
had heard a few from the tradepress.
But there were also a handful ofunintended cases where vessels
with some US connection werecaught in this classification
net.
But for the most part, what Isaw was that China-linked
operators felt the most of thefinancial impact.
And it's interesting because itit kind of almost turned into
like a cash squeeze or a cashgrab on these Chinese carriers.

(16:03):
Because they were, from kind ofhow I saw it, it felt like they
were likely a little stuck,right?
Because if they shifted theirvessels out of US service, they
risked losing customers.
And this is just the purelyChinese operated, because
Chinese operated had a higherlevel.
Chinese built for the most part,most ocean carriers were able to

(16:24):
reposition their fleets.
So they had Korean or Japanesebuilt vessels repositioned into
the US trade lane.
And their Chinese vessels weremoved out of any US trade lanes.
But Chinese operated vesselscouldn't really do that.
So all they had was topotentially move their Chinese

(16:46):
operated vessels maybe into a UScounterpart if it existed.
And that's where they couldmaybe avoid part of it.
But and it doesn't really, Iguess what I'm trying to say is
look, they couldn't really shiftout of the US service because
then they risked losing UScustomers, access to US
customers.

(17:06):
But then if they were to passthe fees on to their customers,
and like I said, none of theother ocean carriers were
passing them on.
And the Chinese-based or Chineseoperated carriers also said the
same thing that they wouldn't bepassing them on.
But had this continued, had theypassed those fees on, they
risked those same customersperhaps going into back to the
market and saying, well, I'mgoing to go find somebody who's

(17:28):
not passing on the fees.
And to be clear, nobody waspassing on the fees.
As far as I can see, as far asI've heard, I have not heard of
anybody saying that any of thesevessel port calls or vessel
fees, these China Section 301vessel when port fees were being
passed on to the shippers.
So most of these ocean carriersthat were Chinese operated just

(17:50):
absorbed the hit themselves.
And that's, I guess, why I seethis as it's kind of just a cash
grab from the US to theseChinese operated carriers.
And so we still have three moredays of that.
However, while this suspensionpauses that financial cash grab,
I guess you could call it, itdoesn't end the policy.

(18:10):
And I think that this isimportant because it's a
temporary hole while the US andChina work through negotiations.
And I think everything is donein good faith here with the full
intention of honoring thecommitments.
But I do think that it's worthkeeping a close eye on because
there's a lot of policy leversthat the president and the
administration can pull ifperhaps China were to fail to

(18:32):
upload some of it, fail touphold some of its commitments.
And I think that this one mightbe an attractive lever to pull,
because this might be one that,like I said, it kind of just
turned into a cash grab that hadlimited impact to US importers

(18:53):
or US consumers because itwasn't getting passed on.
And that's not to say that itwouldn't forever, because that
might be unsustainable to havethat much money coming off the
vessel.
And that was the whole point,right?
When this was first introducedas the vessel fees and the port
fees, these are significantamounts of money for the vessel

(19:13):
operator or the vessel owner tobe taking on as a hit.
It ends up being a little bitmore sliced and diced down to
the shipper should it get passedon.
But everybody said it wasn'tgetting passed on, and that's
what I saw, right?
So for now, the impact ofshipper remains minimal.
And during the pause, I mean, itremains part of the world of

(19:34):
uncertainty.
It seems that the markets areabsorbing the uncertainty a
little bit better, but thegeopolitical significance is
still very active on this.
And I think that it's worth justwatching.
I wouldn't put this on yourcalendar as in one year, this
will be off.
I think that this is one to keepan eye on.
And you know, you know I will.

(19:55):
You know I will.
Keep attuned to this podcast.
I'm gonna keep watching this.
But that's the word, right?
November 10th, we have a pauseon these vessel fees, and that
will extend until November 9th,2026.
So assuming that the commentsfiled and closing in just a few
minutes here are fine.
And USTR thinks that there'snothing too significantly

(20:16):
adverse.
Although there are a few peoplewho did file that they liked
them because they were kind ofserving their purpose of moving
Chinese built vessels out ofU.S.
service.
For the most part, there were alot of shippers and shipper
associations saying, look, theuncertainty of we're not sure if
these fees would ever be passeddown was too much to bear.

(20:38):
They they liked the pause, theyapplaud the pause for most of
the comments that I saw filed.
So I'm gonna keep watching this,but that's it.
Three days from now, we will behaving a pause on these vessel
fees.
I'm gonna keep watching it all.
Look, if all of this politicalmaritime conversation has you
wanting to just maybe get backto basics a bit, check out my
just in time learning course,FMC vs Marad, who does what?

(21:02):
It is part of the just in timelearning series, which is plain
language breakdown of all thingsmaritime, right?
But we have U.S.
maritime agencies in thisspecific course.
Who does what?
What who what's the FMC do?
What does FM, what does Maraddo?
What's the delineation?
I break it down for you in 30minutes or less.
It's available now at theMaritimeprofessor.com.

(21:22):
And I'd also like to say thatthe Maritime Professor is
thrilled to partner this yearwith Manifest Future of Supply
Chain.
February 9th through 11th, 2026,we will be at the Venetian and
Las Vegas joining ManifestFuture of Supply Chain.
Join us in more than 7,000 ofyour closest friends in the
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We have industry leaders,innovators, and investors.

(21:43):
And you can save$200 if you useour link, which is http
manifestvegas.com slash joinslash the maritime professor.
So if you like this episode, besure to follow, subscribe, and
leave a review.
Want to go deeper on thesetopics or bring this kind of
insight to your team, visitthemaritimeprofessor.com to
explore corporate trainings,tailored briefings, and
on-demand webinars, all designedto make complex maritime

(22:05):
regulations practical and easyto understand.
And if your organization needshelp navigating the legal or
strategic side of oceanshipping, head over to Squall
Strategies.
That's where I provideconsulting services, regulatory
guidance, and policy supportacross the global supply chain.
And as always, this podcast isfor educational purposes only.
It is not to be considered legaladvice.

(22:25):
If you need an attorney, contactan attorney.
But until next time, I'm LaurenBeegan, the maritime professor,
and you've just listened to ByLand and By C.
See you next time.

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