What share of the market your company has lost and how you see that a rippling effect throughout the industry . Well i guess going to car gil share gets to be a bit difficult. But if you look at the u. S. Pork industry or the u. S. Beef industry, we certainly have been the largest exporter around the globe. But as we have dealt with issues in the ports like currency and elements the play in the market, weve seen increase particularly in the last year to countries like the eu, chile. And certainly in the last months have seen substantial decline. Do you think that will be permanent. Will we be able to get that market back . I think any time you disappoint a customer it takes time to build trust back. And as i referred to in my testimony, there is a tremendous amount of potential for both beef and pork exports on the global scale. We have a product that the world is look inging for. And values. I certainly believe the Growth Potential remains. But there is no doubt that weve disappointed our Customer Base, primarily in japan, korea and many china over the last couple of months. And that will take some time to rebuild trust. And in disappointing our Customer Base what has been the loss in dollars to port producers and the economy here in this country . Well i dont know that id be the best one i think north American Meat strut estimateinstitute estimated 40 to 50 million per week. We have about fifty containers of chilled pork product in route to japan that our customers are asking can you guarantee us it will arrive in a useful form with shelf life or not. So for me that is about a Million Dollars i have to decide whether im going to put that into a port system. And it either slow down or potentially close closing being a complete loss. So i hope that gives you some perpetrate i. Yes, thank you. Spective. Yes, thank you. With bnsf ms. Farmer im sure you have to look at the possibilities of a shut down and a shut down that would last possibly annex extended period of time. How does that effect the railroad and your planning and what effect does that have on your customers and your thousandes of employees that you have. An example would be this weekend we were notified by the pma that vessel gangs could not be working. So the effect that has on our railroad is that in an average week during this period of the year we would be moving somewhere in the neighborhood of 60 trains off our docks in southern california. That number has been reduced to 30 trains per week. The impact that that has is that we cannot move the freight that wants to move off the west coast. So we will move a limited amount of that freight off the west coast into the interior of the u. S. It will then limit the ability for us to accept freight at our inland hubs. So we will have to turn freight away at the inland hubs that wants to move back to the west coast. In addition i talked about our Capital Expenditures we made. We are now having to store locomotives and equipment that we have added to our fleet to be able to handle the supply chain growth of the country and store that across the railroad because we can no longer continue to send this volume out to the port. When we do it sites on the main line and causes Ripple Effects which impact other customers in addition to our intermodal customers. So the impact really senator fisher is that we cannot move the freight through and we are not using the valuable resources that we have. And that impact when you see the freight migrate from the west coast, what impact does that have on a local community. Absolutely. You know, i think when we look back at history and we know that during 2002. Additional expenditures need to be made somewhere else. There seems to be no doubt among any of our Panel Members that solving this threatened impasse or crisis on the west coast is necessary to americas near term and longer term competitiveness. Is that correct . But moving onto the broader issue. Let me go to the really excellent testimony about our ongoing failure. And it is a kind of slow motion implosion of american competitiveness. The ongoing failure to spend more than 2 of our gdp on Infrastructure Investment. Which is compared to 9 by china, 8 in india 5 in europe. Even in mexico, 4 . And it extends not only to roads and bridges, which are crumb skpblg decaying and decrepit but also to areas of our infrastructure as simple as rail grate crosses. In valhalla new york just days ago we saw the consequences of possibly. We dont know the causes yet. But possibly a rail grade crossing that could have been made safer and could have prevented the deaths and injuries that occurred there. The fact of the matter is that there are more than 2,000 crashes and collisions every year at our rail grade crosses, causing more than 230 deaths. And more than 700 injuries. Not to mention the economic costs of those collisions. Which are very difficult or impossible to calculate. That is just one example of our failure to invest in infrastructure. So let me ask you as to the 2 billion that you recommend as a fund for investment would it make sense to do it through a Public Financing authority or Infrastructure Bank such as has been proposed and advocated by myself, other members of this committee, a very bipartisan proposal that would make available not just 2 billion but very possibly more . I think the concept of a set aside through a public Infrastructure Bank, broader utilization of public and private activity bonds, along with some other finance mechanisms. I think we need to bundle these together. I think anything that costs a lot of money these days is going to take more than one source or resource to make it happen. Back in illinois we dont like to talk about gas tax. But we think in illinois to solve some of the state road and infrastructure problems a gas tax is something we should be looking at. But i do believe that loan guarantees broader use of some of the existing bonding programs tiffia and riff, i think both would help in meeting the demand we have. And i do believe that multiple solutions are going to be necessary. My understanding is that tiffia and riff are both under utilized, in fact billions of dollars have been left on the table in effect as a result of internal problems. Highlighted by the Inspector General very recently. Would you agree . I would agree with that. I think the time it takes to process going through the preapplication and going through that review. The uncertainty quite frankly that comes about when there is long delays in Public Financing tools. All of a sudden the hot project becomes not so hot and they start looking at other infrastructure pieces to accomplish. Expedited review and would go a long way to helping us. New programs is fine but i this i better utilization of existing programs makes sense. And riff is a multibillion opportunity that is lost every day to intermodal transportation. I welcome the emphasis that all of our panel have put on intermodal transportation. As you well expect it is the transportation Growth Opportunity of the future. Thats right. Do any of you have any differences with the points that he has just made . We have vested interest in making sure the supply rain runs efficiently. So we fully support federal focus on fragranteight. We think that is a good thing. Through Infrastructure Bank . We dont necessarily want to drive that decision but we certainly want to be part of the conversation. Thank you. My time has expired. Thank you all. Thank you senator blumenthal. Senator daines. Thank you madam chair. While i get to represent the state of montana. And our number one industry is agriculture. It is about 5 billion just last year. And as yes know in ag, you have to be able to export. And like senator fisher, we dont have a lot of ocean front property in montana. I dont think nebraska does either. And so the supply chain becomes critically important. In fact 80 of montanas wheat is exported. Nearly a billion dollars in 2013. And primarily through the west coast ports. Were very proud of our ranchers and farmers who not only feed america. They feed the world now. I heard concerns certainly about our producers in montana about the backlog we had i think of 3400 cars past due in the region. Could you tell us what the current status of the rail backlog is now in montana . As i have responsibility for intermodal, id be happy to follow up with specific statistics around the backlogs. But what i can tell you is that by any measurement on a year over year basis because of the capital that weve invested because of the milder winter that weve had by any metric that you look at we arefar improved versus last year. We are making significant process by what you have come to expect of us and willdont make progress on those lines. One of the ways products get to the west coast as we discussed is through the use of containers. It can move in hopper cars or containers. And what can i say is that as we limit the inbound flow of containers into the interior of the country it makes it more difficult for me to be able to move that product for export. So that is certainly of concern to us. I can tell you too, last summer our montana ag producers were not so concerned about the rail backlog but the issues going on at the west coast ports. I used to be a supply chain guy myself. Worked for Procter Gamble for 12 years and was in the supply chain. And having appreciation that the chain is only as good as its weakest link. If we cant get the harvest to market we cant realize the Great Potential of our industry. The port of vancouver, the port and the labor dispute that we had going on there that now we see going on in long beach in l. A. It is having a great impact in creating dwindling confidence in our Global Markets t ability for us to deliver. In thinking about our global opportunity as our competitors continue to improve in their products. The differentiator for us longterm to win will be an excellent customer service. The ability to say that when we say the product will be there, it will be there. And when we lose, as senator fisher mentioned, when we lose ability to deliver our customers will look elsewhere to find those same products. In fact i just got a rather haunting email from the president of an Outdoor Products company that manufactures in montana. They have leading Global Market share. In fact they are the only producer of some of these products that are still produced in the United States. The rest are over producing in china. So this u. S. Manufacture, the president of the company emailed me about concerns as we speak about the west coast ports. The unions are putting their interest ahead of their customers customers. And he said if something doesnt happen soon well have no choice but to reduce current hiring plans and potentially lay off some of our current staff. If in your view what, if anything, can be done as we look at these challenges right now with these west coast ports being virtually either slowed down or shut down . Certainly we are not party to the negotiations between the pma and the ilwu. But it is clear to us that there needs to be some speedy resolution of this. The biggest opportunity that i think is in front of us is that it is going to take us several weeks to work off the backlogs that exists. Once some time of resolution comes to bear. We have an opportunity in front of us and that is that Chinese New Year is upon us. And that will give us several weeks of the reduced freight inbound that would allows allow us to catch up. It is very concerning. We need to find a way to resolve this but geernagain were not party to those dpoegss and as such the urgency is really where were focused. Thank you. Thank you senator daines. Senator klobuchar. Thank you very much. Im losing my voice but i want to thank everyone for coming. Especially cargill. A biggest private company in the country. And we have worked extensively with them on those transportation issues. So thank you for being here. Im very glad that we were able to pass the user fee increase from the river act, and i appreciated all the work that people who transport on the river did do get that bill done. As, you know, it was part of the able act. Can you talk please about what the increased revenue will mean for upgrading locks and dams on our nations inland waterway system. My area is in pork exports. I know cargill is very interested in building a strong infrastructure so that we can compete on the global scale. Id be happy to get you written answer from our Corporate Affairs staff so that we can but youre glad that we passed the bill so you can get more infrastructure improvements. I am. Okay. That was supposed to be an easy question. But thats okay. Could you talk about how this works and why it is such a problem if you are able to get things out . As mr. Daines points out we are states not on an ocean. We are on Lake Superior. So the port matters a lot. I was once placed on the ocean subcommittee of this commerce committee. And i remember getting a note when i told them that i was the only senator that didnt have an ocean on ocean subcommittee. And he said well next year just come back and ask for me. In any case can you talk about how inland states depend more on this river traffic. Absolutely. You know the demand for safe wholesome Food Products around the world continues to increase as population increases. And we need very effective, reliable modes of transportation, whether a River Railroad truck or ocean vessel to efficiently move those products to their best value consumer. And our farmer and rancher spiers depend upon us to be able to take those crops and move them efficiently and get the best value so we can in turn pay them a strong value for the hard work that they do raising those crops and those livestock. Thank you. Could you talk about the interrelationship with the ports . And we do have the Lake Superior port, and rail in the intermodal issue. In the last 15, 20 years the number of hours of unscheduled outage in americas locks and dams particularly the mississippi waterway has increased substantially. Has made barge traffic less predictable. And agricultural shippers have been finding alternative routes. And perhaps the easiest way to see this is when you look at the port of new orleans share of u. S. Agricultural exports. It used to be close to 65 about 10 or 15 years ago. And today it is about 45 . It is an impediment for farmers to get product down the river reliably and loaded onto the vessels. And this does create permanent damage. So rather than look at threats of job cuts or of not making investments, there are actual quantitative facts that can be assessed here. Under a Free Trade Agreement there are quotas for the trade of agricultural goods. And if a shipment is displayed beyond a calendar year, then the quota for that year isnt made. The importer on the other side of the trade is normally allowed some small growth rate, say 2 to 3 . But if they dont make their yoet the year before, the 2 to 3 growth rate is applied to a lower base rate. The excess amount is actually filled by other countries that do have reliable systems. Exactly and its going to hurt us competitively internationally. Mr. Greuling. One last question on Public Private part ships. Exports of goods to our neighbors to the north and south and bringing goods in from mexico and canada is really important. Canada is the biggest trading partner we and people dont seem to always realize that. And we are having huge problems at the borders with delays in places Like International falls, minnesota metabothere is an minnesota, there is an issue with a bridge. And ive been working on this. But on the Mexican Border our country has started a lot of Public Private partnerships with building up the infrastructure at the ports of entry. So do you think this is a smart way to go . Because i want to get it rolled out on the northern border as well. We definitely think as the smart way to go. O in our own case were looking at privately built bridges connecting modes of transportation, highway with rail, highway with water ports. Knowing that the users will pay their way their fair share knowing that that money is being invested into that specific infrastructure. We cant afford to build, you know 150 million bridges without some infusion of private equity. That is being used in north africa. Canada. In canada. We have a great example on the ohio river of a toll bridge built with private Equity Funding and one of the Construction Companies actually paid part of the bill. Keep their people employed. So it is a good approach to these. And this project is more about the customs plazas. Right. To try to speed up the back and forth between the countries with the new dawn in north america. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you senator klobuchar. Senator cantwell. Thanks for having this important hearing on movement of freight. When i think of this issue i think so you have many of Washington State and all the products that come through on their way to asia. And we have a short period of time seen Something Like a doubling in the size of the ships over the last five years. So yes we have a lot more capacity. And we obviously have a rising middle class in asia. And they want higher they want more u. S. Products so the question is what are we going to do to meet that demand as it relates to improving our infrastructure . So one of the things thats occurred is the recommendations of the freight mobility board which was chaired by mark downy. And i think ms. Farmer, somebody from the Railroad Association at least participated in that. The question is how do we move forward on those recom