However, the US logistics industry is at a healthier place than it was then.

That reading from 18 months ago was largely inflated by unwanted inventories and high warehousing costs along with an anemic freight market.

March 2024 is a different story as long-planned inventory expansions are being witnessed, along with more efficient levels of utilisation in both warehousing and transportation as the drivers of growth, Zac Rogers, logistics manager’s index analyst and associate professor, supply chain management, department of management, Colorado State University, wrote on the LMI website.

The level of 58.3 is within half a standard deviation from the all-time average of 62.2, suggesting that the overall logistics industry is now at the low end of what the researchers would consider healthy and normal growth.

The change this month was primarily driven by a continued rebuilding of inventory levels (plus 5.3), which at 63.8 are at their highest level since October 2022. This growth has had cascading effects on tightening warehousing capacity (minus 8.2), which is back into contraction territory for the first time since January 2023.

These changes suggest that firms are building up inventories in anticipation of continued consumer spending and that the economy will continue to grow in the near-term, Rogers wrote.

Transportation capacity is down (minus 1.3), but at 59.6 is still higher than transportation prices (53), meaning the country is not yet ready to call an end to the freight recession. Although it is much less severe than it was six months or a year ago.

Researchers at Arizona State University, Colorado State University, Florida Atlantic University, Rutgers University, and the University of Nevada, Reno, and in conjunction with the Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals (CSCMP) issued the latest LMI report.

Fibre2Fashion News Desk (DS)