American Anchor – Agriculture

 

Short Film Series, American Anchor, Shares Stories
from the Great Lakes & St. Lawrence Seaway 

The Great Lakes Seaway Partnership today launched the second installment of American Anchor, a series of short films highlighting key transportation supply chains and illustrating the global and regional impacts of Great Lakes Seaway shipping.

The second American Anchor short film tells the tale of the agricultural supply chain, beginning at farms across the Midwest. After the harvest, agricultural commodities, like grain and soy, make their way to a Great Lakes port. There, the commodities are loaded on a freighter and moved through the largest freshwater lakes in the world. The vessel then makes its way through the St. Lawrence Seaway, a system of locks, canals, and channels in Canada and the United States that allows oceangoing vessels to travel from the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes of North America and vice versa. Next, the cargo traverses the Atlantic Ocean until it reaches its port of call. Then, the exported agricultural products are used to produce everything from bread, pasta, soy milk, and vegetable oil to beer, ethanol, and animal feed.

“The ports in our great American cities are the backbone of the Great Lakes region. We’re proud to do our part and share the ways Great Lakes-Seaway shipping interacts with and affects every citizen. American Anchor represents the idea that we are all participants in the supply chain ranging from shippers to manufacturers and ports to end-users – each plays a critical role in lifting up one another and building a future of prosperity for all,” said Steve Fisher, Executive Director of the American Great Lakes Ports Association and Managing Director of The Great Lakes Seaway Partnership.

Each year, waterborne transportation in the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence region is responsible for supporting over 237,000 jobs and $35 billion in economic activity by moving necessary cargos that support the agriculture, construction, automotive and energy industries. The American Anchor series artfully captures the impact of Great Lakes shipping, the Saint Lawrence Seaway, Great Lakes ports, foreign and domestic vessels, farmers, manufacturers, labor, and the relationship of each to their local and global communities.

“Shipping through the Seaway to the rest of the world helps our U.S. farmers compete effectively in a global market,” said Craig Middlebrook, Deputy Administrator of the Great Lakes St. Lawrence Seaway Development Corporation. “Grain products shipped over the Seaway in international, ocean-going vessels are used to produce products around the world.”

“We are proud of our part in navigating the complexity of Great Lakes shipping,” said Paul Pathy, President and CEO of FedNav Limited. “For more than sixty years, we have helped North American farmers get their crops to the rest of the world through the St. Lawrence Seaway.”