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Potential public uproar seen over China pallets
The longhorned beetle, traveling in hardwood packaging, is expected to create a public-relations nightmare for importers.
BY TOM BALDWIN
JOURNAL OF COMMERCE STAFF
NEW YORK -- Businesses importing from China should be prepared to abandon hardwood packaging and pallets because of the potential public uproar over the Asian longhorned beetle.
The war on the tree-eating beetle has not yet become political, but experts say it likely will as more old hardwood trees have to be cut down to prevent further spread of the beetle.
Cutting down and burning infested trees and others nearby is the only known way to combat the beetle, which has no known predators in North America. Many trees in residential neighborhoods in Chicago and New York City have already had to be destroyed, upsetting local residents who often grew up with the trees.
The Agriculture Department has said that left unchecked the beetle will devour vast American forests and inflict $41 billion in damage to an array of industries. That has the makings of a political powder keg, experts say.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture is already considering regulations that would more strongly encourage, or possibly mandate, the use of non-hardwood packaging for imports from China.
The agency would be more likely to take such drastic steps, experts say, if members of Congress representing constituents whose trees have been cut down begin complaining about measures taken to date to contain the beetle.
Public policy experts familiar with scenarios such as this one say no defense put forth by importers in favor of hardwood packaging will be acceptable if the public believes the future of U.S. hardwood forests may be at stake.
The best way for importers to prepare, they say, is to investigate alternatives and be ready to adopt them if regulations are changed.
This is the sketch drawn by veterans of public policy who have witnessed local issues bloom into larger debates and take on their own political life.
"If there is an alternative, and if the costs are comparable, the people who are doing the importing should look there. It is a very big public-relations problem," said Lew Carter, president of Agnew, Carter, McCarthy, a public-relations firm in Boston.
"Once it takes off and has a life of its own, the industry is going to get handed terms that are not favorable," said Richard Valelly, a political scientist at Swarthmore College.
New York City authorities recently discovered a new infestation of the longhorned beetle in the Bayside section of Queens, snug up against the leafy suburbs of Long Island's North Shore.
This is seven miles north of where investigators first spotted the beetle in the Greenpoint section of Brooklyn in 1996.
The latest infestation received attention in a recent story in The New York Times, but Jordan Goldes, press secretary for the area's congressman, Gary Ackerman, reported there had been no alarm raised in the district.
"We've gotten no feedback at all, no phone calls, no letters. It has not come up at community meetings as far as we know," Mr. Goldes said.
Members of Congress representing other infested areas also see no groundswell of protest from their constituents.
The beetle slips into this country burrowed in woods that Chinese exporters use for packing crates and shipping pallets.
As an interim measure, the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Animal and Plant Health-Inspection Service, or Aphis, banned the importation, after last Dec. 17, of any wood packaging that had not been chemically treated before leaving China.
A document endorsed by the Chinese government testifying the wood had been doctored against the bugs must accompany the cargoes.
Mandating alternative packing materials was one option when the beetle issue became public last September. "It was the step that would have solved it," said Stacey Carter-Lane, a spokeswoman for the Health-Inspection Service.
The USDA is accepting comment until March 22 on new regulations, when a more permanent rule will be written.
Might that rule ban hardwoods?
"We are open to all options, all options including that, but we will wait until after the comment period," Ms. Carter-Lane said.
For now, the advice to shippers seems to be: Be prepared.
Earlier infestations of the bug have popped up on Long Island, near the town of Amityville. A fourth appearance has been seen in Chicago. Neither stirred much political energy.
Given the potential for a political uproar, importing companies and their trade associations need to be prepared to wage a public relations campaign that shows they are partners with authorities in combating the problem.
"The industry does not want to go and make this a political issue, but if it becomes one, industry wants to be able to say, 'We agree with you. We share your concern. And see, here is what we have done to try to correct the situation,' " said Charles McLean, the Washington-based senior managing director of public-relations company Hill & Knowlton.
"Whatever you do, now earns you gold stars. Anything you do because people make you do it earns you nothing," he said.
Others agreed.
"Make sure you abide by all the rules, and go the extra mile," John McNichol, vice president of the Tierney Group, a Philadelphia-based communications company specializing in crisis communications for companies that handle hazardous materials.
Alternative packing materials that are on the market are expensive, such as fiberglass or rubber pallets, and they would have to be sent to China. There are some 60 makers of plastic pallets in 20 states.
So-called slip-sheet pallets, which consist of tough cardboard sheets, are already in Asia. But they require upfront costs of several thousand dollars for fork-lift fittings.
"A plastic pallet can cost one and a half to four times more than a wooden one," said Catherine Fish, co-owner of Woodworks Unlimited, a pallet-broker in Moon Township, Pa., outside Pittsburgh.
These options are ones importers should investigate, experts said.
Said Robert L. Huff, longtime professor of history and political science at Hobart College, in Geneva, N.Y.:
"I see very little that can be done, if the costs are not too great, but to go to the alternative. The debate would be . . . about trees, and that's a very tough one."
Alternatives
Here's a list of alternatives to hardwood packing materials:
Slip-sheet pallets look like cardboard but are much stronger. They require special tooling on a user's forklifts. But they are in stock in Asia.
Rubber pallets are popular where cargoes require customized packaging or where a cargo, such as breakbulk, always rides on the same footprint.
Fiberglass pallets come in a variety of strengths and textures.
The names of pallet producers, and the alternatives that are on the market, are available through the Wood Pallets and Containers Association at (703) 527-7667.
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