Autos, international container trade up, Northwest Seaport Alliance says

With auto imports reaching the highest volume in more than a decade, the Northwest Seaport Alliance has reported first-quarter gains and losses in several categories.

Movement of international TEUs, or standard shipping containers, showed a 4.4 percent increase in the first quarter when compared with the same quarter a year ago. Full containerized exports were up 18.4 percent year-to-date to 233,102 TEUs, while imports were flat, down 1.1 percent at 311,011 TEUs, the alliance said in a release Wednesday.

Compared with March 2015, international container volume in March 2016 was down nearly 22 percent, with the difference due in part to high volumes a year ago as the alliance ports cleared a backlog due to a labor dispute.

Among other data released this week:

▪  Break bulk cargo was down 37.6 percent for the quarter compared with last year.

▪  Autos were up 4.1 percent to 66,821 units.

▪  Logs were down 45.2 percent.

▪  Petroleum was down 63.4 percent.

▪  Molasses was down 3.2 percent.

▪  Container trade with Alaska was down 1.4 percent in the first quarter, compared with the year before.

▪  Container trade with Hawaii was down 20.3 percent.

▪  Overall container cargo weight was up 5.5 percent to 6.15 million metric tons.

▪  The number of vessels visiting alliance harbors rose 5.4 percent to 508.

The ports of Tacoma and Seattle have released joint cargo statistics since last year.

This story was originally published April 20, 2016 at 12:56 PM with the headline "Autos, international container trade up, Northwest Seaport Alliance says."