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The lack of a government policy that promotes domestic energy independence in the United States is a tragic consequence of playing politics for decades. The current rage is the natural gas boom that offers the alternative of producing a plentiful and inexpensive source of fuel. Economic prosperity rests upon cheap and reliable power and natural gas offers the best option.

The state of Michigan set a record for exports in 2011, a sign that the state’s economy is recovering, according to one manufacturing industry advocate. Michigan exported $50.8 billion in exports last year, a $6 billion increase over 2010, according to data from the U.S. Department of Commerce. The biggest winner was exports of transportation equipment, which increased by $3 billion and was up 13.8 percent from 2010 to 2011. “Exports are a critical part of Michigan’s economy,” said Mike Johnston, vice president of Global Affairs for the Michigan Manufacturers Association. “Our market is not down the street or around...

A President Dares Us Once Again. In Lewis Carroll’s classic children’s story, “Alice in Wonderland,” young Alice is wandering through that magical fantasyland when she encounters a talking egg, which confused her by sprinkling clearly-misused words into the conversation. When she called him on it, Humpty Dumpty assumed his most arrogant pose and declared "When I use a word, it means just what I chose it to mean – neither more nor less." How dare the girl call him on his abuse of language?! If he wanted to use a word to mean something it had never meant before, and...

The Run On Europe Begins, As Global Investors Head For The Hills... Henry Blodget Nov. 20, 2011, 9:11 AM Until recently, the concern about Europe was mostly theoretical--a potential train-wreck that would occur if/when the world's lenders decided that the continent's problems extended beyond the basket case known as Greece to Europe's "core" and starting pulling back. Well, that concern is no longer theoretical. It's happening. The world's lenders are increasingly deciding that it's better to be safe than sorry, and they're pulling their money out of Europe As a result, the borrowing costs of many European countries are rising...

<p>Another hot, dry summer has devastated this year’s peanut crop, sending prices for the legume skyrocketing and forcing peanut-butter brands including J.M. Smucker Co.’s Jif, Unilever NV’s Skippy and ConAgra Foods Inc.’s Peter Pan into startling price increases.</p> <p>Wholesale prices for big-selling Jif are going up 30% starting in November, while Peter Pan will raise prices as much as 24% in a couple weeks. Unilever wouldn’t comment on its pricing plans, but a spokesman for Wegmans Food Markets, the closely held supermarket chain in the Northeast U.S., said wholesale prices for all brands it carries, including Skippy, are 30% to 35% higher than a year ago.</p>

Xerox, whose CEO, Ursula Burns, is advising President Obama on exports, last week told its product engineering employees that it is in outsourcing talks with India-based IT services firm HCL Technologies... Burns was appointed last year as vice chairwoman of the President's Export Council, a panel of CEOs advising the Obama administration on how to increase exports, which would lead to an increase in domestic jobs... Burns is outspoken on the need to improve the pool of math and science graduates in U.S. schools. In a recent video interview on CNN, she warned that if graduation rates in these areas...

Natural gas pipeline companies have been Dorothy Ganiear's neighbor in Greene County for as long as she can remember. Pipelines from two companies poke out from the ground in twisting interchanges just over a grassy hillside from her family's 100-acre farm, but noise or accidents never have been a problem, Ganiear said. So when Virginia-based Dominion Resources Inc. offered her money this year to allow the company to run another pipeline under a corner of her Morgan Township property, Ganiear, 61, was happy to help. This is what we all have to live with in order to get the natural...

40 Signs The Chinese Economy Is Beating The Living Daylights Out Of The U.S. Economy It is time to face the truth. The Chinese economy is simply beating the living daylights out of the U.S. economy. Whether you want to call it a rout, a slaughter or a thrashing, the reality is that the Chinese are absolutely embarrassing America on the global economic stage. At this point, the Chinese are playing economic chess while the Americans are playing economic checkers. China is poised to blow past the United States and become the largest economy in the world. Not only that,...

Chinese Exporters Going Down, Western Importers Ambushed February 14, 2011 By Russ Winter “An empty stomach is not a good political adviser.” -Albert Einstein At long last the mainstream media and Chinese advisories are picking up on the China export bust story that I have warned about for months. The New York Times ran this economic story of the decade last week, while infomercial commentators like CNBC and Bloomberg are sleeping through this bust. The twist on the story is that Chinese suppliers are in a triple world of hurt. American buyers resisted attempts to pass on price increases of...

India has now come full circle — from a nation that was under a high-tech embargo for its nuclear weapons program to one receiving an invitation to join a group of nations that regulate export controls. President Barak Obama says the United States is ending its export restrictions on technology that could be used by India's defense and space industries, according to an article in the AFP. "These actions will open important new opportunities for our companies and governments on cooperating in the defense and space areas," said Robert Blake, the assistant secretary of state for South Asia. These are...

New York - Wheat prices are surging after export sales skyrocketed. The U.S. Agriculture Department said Friday that export sales of wheat totaled 1.05 million metric tons last week. It's the highest level since August, when Russia banned wheat exports after a drought devastated much of its crop. (Snip) Wheat for March delivery rose 21 cents, or 2.6 percent, to settle at $8.245 a bushel. March corn added 3.25 cents to settle at $6.5725 a bushel while soybeans slipped 2 cents to $14.1225 a bushel.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Seeking to build ties with an economic rival, the White House said Wednesday that China would purchase $45 billion in U.S. exports, including a highly sought-after $19 billion deal for 200 Boeing airplanes. The announcement came as Chinese President Hu Jintao arrived at the White House for a state visit with President Barack Obama. The deals could soothe some concerns from the U.S. government and corporate America, both of which contend that China keeps its currency artificially low in order to make Chinese products cheaper in the U.S. and U.S. products costlier in China.

JERUSALEM: India has become Israel's second largest export destination after the United States, as the Jewish state focusses on tapping potential in the Asian markets. As per the figures provided by Israel's Export and International Cooperation Institute, India jumped from the eighth position to second as the favoured destination for Israeli exports in the first half of 2010. Israeli exports to India in the first half of this year equalled $990 million, an increase of 102 percent compared to last year. The reason for this sharp jump was a 63 percent leap in exports by Israel's mining, minerals and quarrying...

China has again warned the US not to use the dispute over the value of the Chinese currency, the yuan, as a “scapegoat” for its high unemployment and flagging growth prospects. The artificially weak Chinese currency has become a political issue in the US where it is blamed for giving Chinese exporters an unfair advantage at the cost of US jobs. Photo: Getty The remarks from China’s ministry of commerce came hours before the US was due to release a report on whether it considers China a “currency manipulator” as fears grow that tensions over the currency could lead to...

Chinese Government Predicts Plummeting Exports Ahead Vincent Fernando, CFA Sep. 7, 2010, 4:21 AM If anyone is terrified of trade protectionism right now, it's China. While increased protectionism would likely hurt both China and developed economies such as the U.S. and Europe, China probably has the most to lose since it requires economic growth just to maintain political stability. Thus in the face of mounting pressure abroad, China is promoting itself as a major global import consumer, which it is: China Daily: "China's processing trade (bringing in goods and exporting finished products), which is the bulk of its exports, could...

(Reuters) - President Barack Obama on Tuesday will outline steps his administration is taking to revamp U.S. export restrictions on defense and high-tech goods, which is expected to lead to thousands of less sensitive items being decontrolled, senior administration officials said. "We've done this fundamentally for national security reasons so that we can ... focus our resources on protecting the most critical technologies," one of the senior officials told reporters at a briefing. The initiative, which already has been one year in the making, responds to frustration felt by U.S. defense and high-tech companies, who say export controls that date...

The Chinese market for Michigan goods continues to grow. So it's strange that politicians here continue to point fingers at Chinese trade for Michigan's economic decay. Since 2005, Michigan's exports to China increased by 91 percent, while Michigan's exports to the world dropped by 14 percent, largely due to a substantial decrease in 2009. However, it appears that state exports recovered in 2010. First quarter data shows that Michigan's exports are returning to 2010 levels and that our exports to China are having a banner year.

China Posts A MONSTER Trade Surplus, As Exports Surge 44% Joe Weisenthal Jul. 11, 2010, 9:05 AM Image: AP The most-hyped economic event of the year was when for one month China actually showed a trade deficit. That was back in May that it was announced, but it was a joke, purely an artifact of seasonal patterns and the Lunar New Year. Still a lot of folks ran with it, as though it was a big deal, calling for an imminent DEVALUATION of the yuan. Well, now... Bloomberg: China’s trade surplus widened to the highest this year and exports climbed...

Chinese Export Rumors Were True Vincent Fernando, CFA Jun. 10, 2010, 4:31 AM It turns out that rumors of Chinese export performance were true. Xinhua: China's exports surged by 48.5 percent year on year in May, while the imports climbed 48.3 percent, the General Administration of Customs (GAC) announced Thursday. The growth rate for exports was 18.1 percentage points up from the figure for April, and the import growth rate dipped slightly from 49.7 percent reported in April.[snip]

The U.S. Treasury Department wisely delayed its semiannual report on global exchange rates so that more sensible heads can prevail before we stumble into a trade fight with China. The congressionally mandated report surveys exchange rates and other indicators of the global economy and determines whether any U.S. trading partners are guilty of "currency manipulation." Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner announced this month that he would delay the scheduled April 15 release to give more time to negotiate with top Chinese officials. President Obama's meeting with Chinese President Hu Jintao in Washington this week brought no breakthrough, but it did...

China has had an extraordinary run since 1980. But like Japan and Southeast Asia before it, dramatic growth rates cannot maintain themselves in perpetuity. Japan and non-Chinese East Asia didn’t collapse and disappear, but the crises of the 1990s did change the way the region worked. The driving force behind both the 1990 Japanese Crisis and the 1997 East Asian Crisis was that the countries involved did not maintain free capital markets. Those states managed capital to keep costs artificially low, giving them tremendous advantages over countries where capital was rationally priced. Of course, one cannot maintain irrational capital prices...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Barack Obama, anxious to spur growth and tackle unemployment, will name two top executives from Boeing and Xerox on Thursday to spearhead his drive to boost U.S. exports, the White House said. Obama, who pledged in his State of the Union address to double U.S. exports over five years to support 2 million jobs, will make the announcement in Washington when he speaks to the Export-Import Bank's annual conference on his trade strategy. A White House official said Obama would name Boeing Co president and chief executive Jim McNerney and Xerox Co chief executive Ursula Burns...

(Reuters) - With economic policy stimuli already at full tilt, no government wants an overvalued exchange rate to slay recovery, and the rival "soft currency" needs are producing some elaborate rhetorical jousting. The problem is that major exchange rates -- at least those between the developed G4 economies of the United States, euro zone, Japan and Britain -- are largely market determined and difficult to control. There's no magic wand to conjure up devaluation and the monetary and fiscal levers that could possibly engineer a free-floating depreciation are near exhausted. G4 interest rates remain near zero. New money and liquidity...

President Obama's pick to help oversee U.S. export controls for the Commerce Department is a lawyer and political supporter who has been providing export advice to Fortune 500 companies such as arms manufacturer Raytheon and aerospace giant Boeing. But while White House officials and members of Congress have lauded Kevin J. Wolf's experience for the Commerce job, his recent legal work effectively appears to bar him from potential matters involving dozens of companies

Japan Factory Output Jumps, Momentum In Doubt Stanley White Mon Dec 28, 2009 2:46am ESTTOKYO (Reuters) - Japan's industrial output rose for the ninth consecutive month in November, driven by strong exports and domestic subsidies, but swelling inventories and falling wages threaten to end the longest climb in more than 12 years. Demand from the United States and Asia contributed much to last month's 2.6 percent rise, government data showed on Monday, supporting the Bank of Japan's view that the world's second-largest economy will continue its moderate recovery next year. Economists say overseas demand should prevent a return to recession...

Released on October 28, 2009 (Next Release on November 4, 2009) Changing Distillate Export Patterns Distillate (including diesel) is the second largest petroleum product consumed in the United States, used for everything from fuel for trucks and trains to residential heating and even a small amount of power generation. Although still overshadowed by gasoline consumption within the United States, global trends have been rapidly increasing the demand for distillate. This is causing major changes in the United States’ role in the world distillate market. For many years, the United States was a net importer of relatively small volumes of distillate,...

Container Trade in TEUs* 2009 Year-to-Date*TEUs: 20-foot equivalent units or 20-foot-long cargo container **Preliminary estimate   Loaded Inbound Loaded Outbound Empties Total Containers January 200,588 88,510 110,197 399,295 February 149,299 92,781 75,962 318,042 March 186,450 117,674 70,007 374,131 April 199,051 112,976 96,678 408,705 May 208,591 121,064 89,900 419,555 June 206,358 114,107 92,882 413,347 July 221,719 108,420 102,874 433,013 August 249,920 130,623 112,796 493,339 September 224,924 109,337 106,103 440,364 October November December Year-to-Date 1,846,900 995,492 857,399 3,699,791 YTD % Change -23.8% -26.3% -24.2% -24.6%

The number of laid up containerships increased 10.4 per cent in a fortnight, according to the latest Alphaliner survey, which showed 568 ships were idle, aggregating 1.35 million TEU as of October 12 from the 548 idle vessels, totalling 1.29 million TEU, noted two weeks earlier. The Paris-based agency said laid up fleet is now the biggest ever. Apart from ships in the 1,000-TEU - 2,000 TEU range (7,500-TEU plus sized ships lay-up rate remained steady), all sizes showed increases in idling during the two-week period. Alphaliner also reported that the raft of service cutbacks by major carriers had an...

An American exporter sells his goods to a British importer and is paid in British pounds sterling. But he cannot use British pounds to pay the wages of his workers, to buy his wife’s clothes or to buy theater tickets. For all these purposes he needs American dollars. Therefore his British pounds are of no use to him unless he either uses them himself to buy British goods or sells them (through his bank or other agent) to some American importer who wishes to use them to buy British goods. Whichever he does, the transaction cannot be completed until the...

The world's ship owners and government economists would prefer you not to see this symbol of the depths of the plague still crippling the world's economies The biggest and most secretive gathering of ships in maritime history lies at anchor east of Singapore. Never before photographed, it is bigger than the U.S. and British navies combined but has no crew, no cargo and no destination. Do not tell these men and women about green shoots of recovery. As Briton Tim Huxley, one of Asia's leading ship brokers, says, if the world is really pulling itself out of recession, then all...

Port Tracker report projects retail imports to be at lowest level since 2002 Container trade imports will fall 20 percent in August and September and another 18 percent in October, pushing overall retail imports for 2009 down to the lowest level since 2002, industry forecaster IHS Global Insight said in a report released Thursday. In its Port Tracker report, released with the National Retail Federation, the group said the sharp pullback in peak season shipping will leave import shipping volume measured in TEUs down 18.8 percent in 2009 compared to last year. The 12.3 million 20-foot-equivalents IHS Global Insight estimates...

...In "The Graduate"...Dustin Hoffman's Benjamin is given a one-word bit of career counseling by one of those shallow and corrupt grown-ups at a shallow and corrupt grown-up cocktail party: "Plastics." Forty-two years later, the line has picked up a meaning that the makers of "The Graduate" could not possibly have anticipated.. today, the reaction is, "Oh, right: America still made things then." We don't any more...Since 1987, manufacturing as a share of our gross domestic product has declined 30 percent. Once the world's leading net exporter, we have become the world's leading net importer. In 2007, we exported $1.2 trillion...

One growing export has tipped the U.S.-China trade balance: live turtles. Each year millions of U.S. turtles that are hatched in farms or caught in the wild are devoured in China, where the onetime delicacy has become more available to the masses. The Chinese eat turtles—especially softshell and snapper species—and use the animals' parts in traditional medicines that are said to boost everything from the immune system to sexual prowess. But conservationists worry that this high demand will cause some U.S. turtle species to be eaten to extinction. That's why the U.S. state of Florida just passed a tough new...

TRANSPACIFIC lines are preparing to tear up annual contracts signed less than two months ago in a desperate bid to shore up their finances. The 14 members of the Transpacific Stabilization Agreement issued a stark warning to their customers that freight rates agreed for service contracts signed in May were not sustainable over the typical 12-month term and may have to be renegotiated. In an unprecedented move, that reflects the plight of the industry, the TSA issued a statement saying members had adopted a voluntary across-the-board increase of $500 per feu effective from August 10. This will apply to rates...

One could be forgiven for thinking that contracts in shipping are no longer worth the paper they are written on. First we had charterers in the dry bulk sector simply walking away from unfavourable contracts at the top of the market. Now in container shipping we have lines on the transpacific trade trying to unilaterally increase rates on annual contracts just months after they were agreed. It would certainly be interesting to be a fly on the wall when shipping line sales people meet major US shippers and try to explain that they now, in effect, want to tear up...

China is expected to ban imports of U.S. chicken in coming days, a move likely to deliver a blow to the struggling American chicken industry and escalate trade tensions between the two nations. James H. Sumner, president of the Georgia-based USA Poultry & Egg Export Council, said he learned Tuesday from "several importers" in China that the U.S. wouldn't receive any import permits from the country's ministry of commerce starting July 1. Mr. Sumner said he has informed the U.S. Embassy in Beijing and that it is looking into the matter. There has been no official confirmation from the Chinese...

Fear of the Administration’s drive toward a more protectionist American economy has gone global. Brazil, Japan, Australia, the European Union, and Canada are voicing concerns over the Buy American policy. Canada, who sends 75 percent of its exports to America and owns half of GM and Chrysler, has already had measures of retaliation of U.S products

There is no shortage of cleverness among the bureaucrats who run China. Exports in May fell more than 26% according to the country’s custom’s agency. That rate was worse than the 22.6% decline in April. To balance the drop in exports, the Chinese government has continued to pump what it says will be $585 billion into the national economy. That helped May capital investment spending to jump almost 39%. Economists began to talk about the miracle of the Chinese government when GDP in the world’s most populous nation began to pick up substantially two months ago. Most analysts stayed away...

U.S. exporters will see ongoing equipment shortages in the months ahead, and the container shortages could become even worse if imports from Asia do not pick up significantly during the peak shipping season. The equipment imbalance is occurring at an especially bad time for shippers of agricultural products because exports are starting to pick up after a lackluster first quarter. If exporters can not secure more empty containers for their products, the export boom will be snuffed out before it gathers steam. Agricultural exporters in the U.S. interior are at greatest risk. "Eastbound cargo isn't delivered where westbound cargo is...

NEW DELHI (AFP) — India's exports plunged 33 percent in April, the biggest slide in 18 years, but the bad news Monday was offset by a survey showing stronger manufacturing and higher car sales. The trade figures marked the seventh month in a row that exports have dropped, hit by a demand slump in global markets, official data showed. Exports slid to 10.74 billion dollars in April from 16.08 billion dollars a year ago as the appetite for made-in-India goods contracted -- the worst figures since November 1991, economists said. But the gloomy data coincided with a report showing domestic...

Russian arms exports are expected to increase by $700-$800 mln in 2009 despite the global credit crunch, state arms exporter Rosoboronexport said on Wednesday. "Rosoboronexport sells an additional $700-800 million [worth of weaponry] every year. Despite the crisis, 2009 will be no exception," company official Valery Varlamov said.

Russia's state arms exporter Rosoboronexport is expecting $7 billion in foreign sales in 2009 despite the ongoing global economic crisis, a defense industry official said on Wednesday. Rosoboronexport sold about $7 billion worth of weaponry in 2008 and has a current portfolio of orders worth a total of $27 billion. "Our situation is stable. We have reached a high level [of arms sales], and we are expecting this year roughly the same amount as in 2008, which is about $7 billion," said Alexander Brindikov, the head of a group of advisers to Rosoboronexport.

Japan's ...exports tumbled 49.4 percent... Demand plunged in all regions of the world, particularly North America, Europe and Russia. The dismal figures highlight the grim outlook for Japan's export-oriented economy, the world's second-largest. Japan, which had relied foreign sales of its cars and gadgets to drive economic growth, now finds itself mired in its deepest recession since the end of World War II.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE No. 09-65 Governor Announces Alaska’s Exports Remain Strong Alaska’s 2008 exports at $3.6 billion March 26, 2009, Anchorage, Alaska - Governor Sarah Palin today announced another strong year for Alaska’s trade performance. The value of the state’s exports reached $3.6 billion in 2008, the fourth-best year ever for exports. “Alaskans benefit from export activity. Given what is happening in economies around the world, it’s clear that Alaska’s economy remains strong and our resources are still highly valued,” said Governor Palin. The governor noted Alaska’s international activity also includes more than just export of natural resources. International interest...

February loaded oceangoing cargoes at the side-by-side ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach fell 36.6 percent from the previous February, the two ports showed in separate reports. The slowdown for February is much more pronounced than it was in January, when the year-on-year decrease in cargo traffic at the two Southern California ports was 18.7 percent. The ports are the two busiest in the United States, handling more than 40 percent of imported consumer goods. The two ports showed inbound cargoes down 38.8 percent and outbound cargoes down 32.2 percent in February 2009 from February 2008. The traffic fell...

The collapse in China’s exports last month was even worse than the headline figure suggests, says Mark Williams, an international economist at Capital Economics. Import data give no sign that the economy has bottomed out. Exports declined by 25.7% on a year-to-year basis and imports by 24.1%. Relatively mild contractions in exports over the previous three months had suggested China’s exporters were proving more resilient than their regional counterparts. However, he says, the latest figures disprove this theory. After adjusting for the number of working days in each month, exports from China fell by roughly 40% on a yearly basis...

The global financial crisis has taken its toll on China, sending exports from the workshop of the world tumbling in February, slashing its trade surplus and raising the possibility of a deficit. Exports in February slid 25.7 per cent from a year earlier, dwarfing forecasts of a 5.0 per cent fall, while imports dropped 24.1 per cent, close to projections of a 25.0 percent decline. The resulting trade surplus was only $4.84 billion (£3.5 billion), a three-year low, compared with $39.1 billion in January and a record $40.1 billion in November, the customs administration said. That was far short of...

Japan logged its largest trade deficit ever in January as exports nearly halved due to a sharp slowdown in the global economy amid a worldwide credit crisis.

Some home builders already struggling in Florida's dismal housing market are facing another headache: The Chinese-made drywall they used is causing unpleasant odors and possibly leading to electric problems in dozens of homes constructed during the housing boom.

<p>At the docks here, the stacks of shipping containers that used to loom above the highway overpass are gone. Logistics managers say they negotiate deeper discounts every week on ships that are leaving half empty.</p> <p>In nearby Guangdong Province, so many factories are closing without paying employees that some workers are resigning pre-emptively and demanding immediate pay before their employers go bankrupt.</p>