Guides

Container tracking for fresh produce importers

Why tracking positions are often wrong, what the milestones actually mean, and how to turn a container number into a decision you can act on.

• Why tracking positions are often wrong The dot on a container tracking map is usually a guess. Here is how interpolation works, when it fails, and how to tell a real AIS fix from an estimate.
• Why does my ETA keep changing? Because it was never a promise. What an ETA is actually built from, why it moves, and which movements are worth acting on rather than watching.
• How to track a reefer container end-to-end What to watch at each stage of a refrigerated container's journey, which events actually change what you do, and why the temperature log matters most.
• What a modern reefer can and cannot do for your fruit A reefer removes heat rather than adding cold. What that means for your setpoint, whether controlled atmosphere earns its cost, and what is changing.
• Understanding the documents in a fresh produce import What each document in a produce import is for, who issues it, when it has to arrive, and which ones stop your container leaving the terminal.
• Demurrage and detention: how importers lose money on free time Where the charges come from, why they escalate, the mistakes that cause most of them, and what actually works to avoid paying them.
• Reefer shortages: why there is never a box when you need one Reefer equipment is scarce by design, and scarcest exactly when your season peaks. Here is what causes it, what it costs you, and the parts you can influence.
• Transit time is shelf life: the real cost of rerouting A longer voyage does not add cost at the margin. It moves days out of the part of the journey that sells fruit and into the part that does not.
• Why 19th-century sailing routes might matter again for fresh produce Wind-assisted ships are routed for wind, not distance. What that changes on a reefer lane, and why it costs you no days.
• Food miles are misleading: what actually drives your import carbon footprint Distance is a poor guide to carbon. Why the mode matters more than the miles on a produce lane, and what a retailer can actually require you to report.

The air-to-sea frontier: which perishables cross next

Sea freight costs a fraction of air. The four things that decide whether a commodity can make the switch, and where each one sits on the line today.