NFC turns its eye to the USA
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I FORECAST some time ago that America would be the next country in which the National Freight Consortium would seek outlets for expansion. I was right. Ted Wall, managing director of NFC International Holdings Ltd, who has travelled a long way since he left Wincanton in Somerset, is to move his base later this year from Australia to the USA.
There he may be able to pick up a bargain or two. "Regulated and unregulated carriers have been knocked cab over axle by the combination of recession and deregulation," says The Economist. in the past six years about 300 out of the 2,500 licensed operators with a turnover exceeding $1m a year have gone bankrupt. Some 40 per cent of the survivors are said to be operating at a loss.
Now the Interstate Commerce Commission in Washington wants to turn the knife in the wound by allowing unregulated owner-operators to compete for traffic at present reserved to regulated carriers. But it seems that the industry has a breathing space at least until after the presidential election in November, during which time one hopes that it will receive a blood transfusion.