White House Announces Grant Flexibility, Data Sharing Initiative in Supply Chain 'Action Plan'
The Biden administration will allow increased flexibility for existing port grants and support new pop-up container yards for the Port of Savannah as part of a new Biden-Harris Action Plan for America’s Ports and Waterways announced in a fact sheet Nov. 9. The plan “will mobilize federal agencies and lay the foundation for successful implementation of the historic Bipartisan Infrastructure Deal,” which includes $17 billion in funding to improve supply chain infrastructure, the White House said.
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The Department of Transportation will immediately allow port authorities to redirect cost savings from projects funded by grants into initiatives that tackle supply chain challenges, the fact sheet said. The Georgia Port Authority will be allowed to reallocate more than $8 million to convert existing inland facilities into “five pop-up container yards in both Georgia and North Carolina.” The new container yards “will free up more dock space and speed goods flow in and out of the Port of Savannah, which leads the nation in containerized agricultural exports,” it said.
In the next 45 days, DOT will award $230 million in grants under its Port Infrastructure Development Grant program, as well as $13 million under its Marine Highway Program. Within 60 days, the administration will develop a “roadmap” for more than $4 billion in funding to repair outdated port infrastructure and deepen harbors for larger cargo ships. In the next 90 days, the plan will prioritize key ports of entry for $3.4 billion in modernization and expansion funding, and open competition for the first round of $475 million in port infrastructure grants funded through the infrastructure deal, the fact sheet said.
DOT also will work with the Federal Maritime Commission toward a framework for exchanging data between different supply chain actors, the lack of which currently “causes delays and inefficiencies as cargo moves from one part of the supply chain to another,” the fact sheet said. DOT and the FMC will publish a request for information “on standardized data exchange requirements for goods movement in the transportation supply chain,” the White House said, giving no time frame for the effort.
The same day the action plan was announced, President Joe Biden met with the CEOs of Walmart, UPS, FedEx and Target to “discuss steps that the Administration and private sector can take to further strengthen our supply chains and build on steps we’ve already taken to speed up deliveries and lower prices,” according to the White House press office. He received updates from the CEOs on the steps they’re taking to speed up the supply chain, and reiterated the administration’s “near- and long-term steps we’re taking to make our supply chain more resilient,” including the action plan, a White House official said.