Experts Call for Action as US Shipping Industry Trails China

The U.S. shipping industry has dwindled over past decades while China’s has drastically grown, putting the United States at an economic and military disadvantage, according to experts at a roundtable discussion held in Washington on July 9. The roundtable, entitled “Reinvigorating the U.S.-Flag Fleet and Shipbuilding Industry,” was attended by maritime industry leaders and the Transportation Subcommittee on Coast Guard and Maritime Transportation. During the discussion, committee chairman U.S. Rep. Daniel Webster (R-Fla.) outlined the shipbuilding industry’s challenges since the industry mobilized during World War II. The United States, he said, produced more than 5,000 ships during the war to deliver Allied troops and supplies to the Atlantic and Pacific theaters. By the 1950s, the U.S. flagged, privately‐owned merchant fleet accounted for half the world’s cargo shipping capacity....