Move over, cheese steaks. Philly is gaining fame these days for beef of another ilk.
At Brazil’s Porto Itapoá, the first shipment of Brazilian beef to the United States is lifted aboard Hamburg Süd’s Monte Aconcagua.
Setting the table for plans to this year bring 25,000 tons of Brazilian beef to the Port of Philadelphia, Hamburg Süd has initiated the first program for imports into the United States of fresh cattle meat from Latin America’s largest country. Following efforts since 2001 by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Brazilian Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Supply to develop a requisite protocol, the historic import program got under way Oct. 14, with trail shipments of 250 tons into the Philadelphia Regional Port Authority’s Packer Avenue Marine Terminal via Hamburg Süd’s Monte Aconcagua.
Juergen Pump, senior vice president of Hamburg Süd North America Inc., is confident that the import program will be an ongoing success, calling it “a testament to the leadership role” that Hamburg Süd and the Port of Philadelphia play in the temperature-controlled cargo supply chain.
“We are very pleased to have been nominated to be the ocean carrier of choice and are looking forward to doing our part in providing high-quality transportation services for the meat industry and to the Port of Philadelphia,” Pump went on to say, offering the projection of about 25,000 tons of Brazilian beef imports for 2017.
The Philadelphia Regional Port Authority’s chief executive officer, Jeff Theobald, commented, “It’s proof positive that Philadelphia is a leader in the handling of refrigerated cargos, and this is certainly a significant cargo that we will need to handle efficiently as we work to grow the port’s cargo volumes to new levels.”
“I’m pleased that we, as a port community, were able to work effectively with Greenwich Terminals, trade interests like the Meat Importers Council of America, and others to help bring this cargo to the port,” Theobald added.
As Pump explained to the American Journal of Transportation, the shipper receives precooled containers at origin in Brazil and, observing strict rules regarding air circulation in the units, stuffs the containers with boxes of frozen or chilled beef. The containers are then loaded onto Hamburg Süd vessels at Porto Itapoá in the southern region of Brazil for ocean transport to Philadelphia.
Pump noted that the process benefits from the fact that Hamburg Süd has one of the world’s youngest fleets of temperature-controlled containers, commonly called reefers, with more than 80,000 such 40-foot-long units.
After discharge at the Packer Avenue terminal, operated by Greenwich Terminals LLC, the reefer units are trucked to local cold storage facilities, such as those of the New Jersey-based Mullica Hill Group and Holt Logistics Corp.’s Delaware Avenue Enterprises Inc.
Frozen Brazilian beef is loaded into a precooled container for shipment by Hamburg Süd to the Port of Philadelphia.
“We are proud that Greenwich Terminals, along with the Holt family, have a worldwide reputation for efficiency and innovation in the area of refrigerated shipping and cold chain logistics, and to be trusted by JBS for these first shipments of Brazilian beef into our U.S. markets is something we don’t take lightly,” said David Whene, president of Greenwich Terminals LLC. “We’re going to do excellent work for them.” In the case of the initial October shipment, frozen front cuts of JBS S.A. Brazilian beef headed to JBS USA processing facilities. The Brazilian product is noted for its leanness, which makes it ideal for combining with typically fattier U.S. cuts to produce consumer-grade ground beef, as well as for such end uses as frozen pizza topping.
Daniel Sorbello, import director at Mullica Hill Cold Storage, said, “We are honored and fortunate to be able to assist the facilitation of this initial JBS shipment to the Port of Philadelphia, via Hamburg Süd, but even more encouraged to see the initiation of a new trade lane that will further enhance a diversified portfolio of quality protein products being supplied to the U.S. consumer.”
The import program got the go-ahead after determination by USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service that fresh Brazilian beef, chilled or frozen, meets quality and safety standards for entering the U.S. market. JBS is one of a handful of private firms to have gained USDA approval for sale and handling of the product.
The Brazilian beef shipments extend the longstanding relationship between Hamburg Süd and the Port of Philadelphia, which the carrier has served since 1957.
For more than a quarter of a century, Paul Scott Abbott has been writing and shooting images for the American Journal of Transportation, applying four decades of experience as an award-winning journalist.
A graduate of Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism, with a master’s magna cum laude from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, Abbott has served as president of chapters of the Propeller Club of the United States, Florida Public Relations Association and Society of Professional Journalists.
Abbott honed his skills on several daily newspapers, including The Cincinnati Enquirer, The Richmond (Va.) News Leader, Albuquerque Journal and (South Florida) Sun-Sentinel, and was editor and publisher of The County Line, a weekly newspaper he founded in suburban Richmond, Va.
A native Chicagoan, he is a member of American Mensa and an ever-optimistic fan of the Chicago Cubs.
