Business View Magazine | Volume 9, Issue 3

156 BUSINESS VIEW MAGAZINE VOLUME 9, ISSUE 3 agency called the Maritime Administration Dept. of Transportation that is charged with educating shippers. And we’re currently asking Congress to encourage Maritime Administration to get out there and do just that – educate the shippers about container-on-barge. That’s the most innovative piece of transportation that we’re providing at this point on the river system.” BVM: Is advocacy one of the main services you provide members? Andres: “Yes. Advocacy is a large component of what the association does. Not only advocating Congress for funds to improve operation maintenance on the river system, but advocacy towards federal agencies and the services they provide in the transportation sector. IRPT has three full-time and one part-time people on staff and we do all the advocacy work ourselves – take our passion and hit the Hill and we’re loving every second of it. We can actually see and when he retired in 2004, he ‘jumped ship’ and started buying short-line railroads. So he is now actually a paying member of IRPT– because nobody gets it for free. I hope am making him proud. I feel totally blessed to be working for this association. The port directors, the terminal operators, anyone that works in and around the river industry are just good people doing great work.” BVM: What major challenge is the industry facing today? Andres: “The biggest challenge we have as an industry is shipper education. We need to educate more shippers and owners of cargo about the opportunities and the capabilities of our river system to transport freight. Currently, we’re operating under capacity, which means we could take in a whole new influx of cargo, of commodities, of shippers, of industries. Those industries that currently rely on the rivers for transportation are energy, fossil fuels, timber, petroleum, aggregates but we could take on a whole new slew of commodities. One of which is containers. “I’m super excited and proud of the members in our association who are getting into the container transport business on the river system. They are forward-thinking, innovative leaders that are thinking outside the box – pun intended. Putting those container boxes on a barge. We could put 36, 40-foot containers from different owners on one barge. We can offer a transportation hub. For example, if you had Memphis as a destination for a container-on- barge route, we could have 36 different shipping companies that could utilize the same barge. Just like the airlines, with 150 people on one plane. That’s 150 customers. Essentially, that is exactly what container-on-barge is. “When we can finally get in front of the shippers and raise awareness as to our capabilities, they’re all for it. Luckily, we have a federal Aimee Andres, Executive Director