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 With cargo delays rippling through the U.S. economy, Japanese
carmaker Honda Motor Co Ltd said it planned to slow production at
some of its North American plants starting on Monday because of a
lack of parts from Asia.
Under pressure to address the months-long strife, President Barack
Obama on Saturday dispatched U.S. Labor Secretary Tom Perez to
California to help broker an agreement.
By Sunday morning, 34 container ships, tankers and other cargo
vessels were waiting to dock at the ports of Los Angeles and Long
Beach, California, up from 32 on Saturday, said Lee Peterson, a
spokesman for the port of Long Beach.
Cargo ships waiting at anchor and unable to load their goods were
visible from highways and beaches for miles along the coast, an
unusual spectacle, he said.
Those delays have slowed deliveries of a wide range of goods, from
agricultural produce to housewares and apparel, leading retailers to
pressure Obama to intervene.
 Honda, which had already resorted to transporting some parts by
airplane, said it would adjust production at plants making models
including the Civic, CR-V, Accord and Acura.
"This is a fluid situation due to the uncertainty of the situation
at the West Coast ports," spokesman Mark Morrison told Reuters by
email. "At this time, we do not have a sufficient supply of several
critical parts to keep the production lines running smoothly and
efficiently."
The Obama administration's move to send Perez came after shippers
vowed to prevent the loading and unloading of freight through Monday
from container ships at the 29 ports, barring a settlement in talks
with the dock workers' union.
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The shipping companies said they were unwilling to pay union workers
higher wages for weekend shifts and the Presidents' Day holiday on
Monday while productivity declined and cargo backups reached the
point of near gridlock, after months of chronic congestion in
freight traffic.
The Department of Labor is working on Perez's schedule, spokeswoman
Xochitl Hinojosa said on Sunday.
“The secretary will meet with the parties to urge them to resolve
their dispute quickly at the bargaining table," she said.
On Friday, negotiators for the union representing 20,000 dockworkers
at the ports and management's bargaining agent, the Pacific Maritime
Association, agreed to a federal mediator's request for a 48-hour
news blackout. The two sides held a bargaining session on Thursday
that marked their first face-to-face meeting in nearly a week.
(Additional reporting by Jeff Mason in Rancho Mirage, Calif.;
Editing by Stephen Powell, Nick Zieminski and Peter Cooney)
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