Over the past decade, the freight forwarding industry has emerged as one of the most successful sectors of the global logistics industry. The substantial growth of globalization has led manufacturing to locate to various remote locations around the world. The development of such new economies have increased the demand for international forwarding services due to which new companies have been popping up every day. These are the latest happenings that have taken place in this exciting and fast paced industry.

• A recent survey conducted in the United States has revealed that despite the recovering economy, 46% of the companies are preparing to invest in new product development to keep up with customer demands in the upcoming 18 months.

• Norbert Dentressangle or ND as it is most commonly known has announced a 39% rise in operation margin in the first half of 2010 following the acquisition of the US based freight forwarding company Schneider Logistics. French owned ND announced the take over of the air, ocean forwarding and customs house of Schneider on 31^st August of this year. The company also showed an increase in turnover of 3.9% and also a 7.3% increase in transport revenue. The company hopes that the acquisition of Schneider will see it through a fairly successful year and would put them ahead of their existing competitors.

• A dry cargo ship Damanta arriving from Russia’s Sakhalin sank on Tuesday the 9^th of November in the port of Wakkanai of Japan’s northernmost Hokkaido island. The coast guard officers reported that water had flooded the ship, and it sank slightly more than 10 meters away from the berth. There were seven Russian nationals aboard all of which were rescued. An oil spill developed at the site of the sinking, and the Japanese authorities have started looking into the incident.

• Five countries at the Fourth Acmecs Summit have agreed to support the development of the South Economic Corridor that will link the proposed sea port in the south of Burma to the south of Thailand and onwards to Malaysia as a new trade lane in the region.  The South-South Economic Corridor would also complement the US$6.66 billion railroad project with proposed financing by China from Nong Khai in the northeast of Thailand, through Bangkok and the south of Thailand to Padang Besar in Malaysia. It would be an extension of the railroad to be built in Laos to connect the south of China. The project aims to make the area a trade and logistics hub. Although the countries are optimistic about the project industry experts have raised their doubts about its successful completion owing to the project’s massive scale.