Shipping numbers show coal and potash surge, grain still down

With Thunder Bay being a grain port, the local port authority is growing concerned with the fact that grain cargo is already down 20 per cent this season.

Despite coal jumping 40 per cent and potash up 60 per cent this year compared to 2009, on average 70 per cent of cargo arriving at the port is grain, said Thunder Bay Port Authority CEO Tim Heney, who added that the drop will affect grain elevator employees.

"Anytime you lose that much grain, you’re going to lose hours of labour," Heney said, noting there’s a combination of factors resulting in the grain decrease.

"There’s been a really wet spring and summer in the prairies and that’s affected the planting," he said. "We’re not looking for a really strong fall either."

The Canadian Wheat Board extended their rail program to May this year and grain is also being shipped to Europe from the West Coast. Heney added that ships that once commonly visited Thunder Bay have since scrapped their lake fleet and the iron ore business has picked up on the other side of Lake Superior.

"A bunch of factors come together and it’s really lowered our tonnage this year on grain," he said. "It’s not likely we’re going to make a lot of that tonnage back up."

But it’s not all doom and gloom for the port this season. There have been more ocean ships on the Great Lakes this year, which happens when the steel industry rebounds.

And the port authority has been trying to diversify the cargo entering the city, which brings in more ships to carry grain out.

"This year we’ve already done one ship so far of wind turbines," Heney said. "We have four more coming and there’s some other project cargo as well … we’re starting to see the oil sands come back a little bit. It will probably be next year before they start moving any cargo."

"That’s been a bit of a bright light for us," he added.

The port authority is optimistic about the season because of the project cargo coming through and an effort to market Thunder Bay in the west as well as the jump in coal.

The Thunder Bay Port Authority sees about 400 ships a year. They’re down 12 from this time last year but Heney said they should still see 400 by the season’s close.