It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
So-called bouillon restaurants are mushrooming all over France, reviving a traditional low-cost Gallic meal concept that can compete with fast-food on prices and easily beat it on quality.
“It’s exploding! 253 bouillon restaurants have opened in France in four years,” Bernard Boutboul, a restaurant consultant, told AFP.
“It’s an ultra-intensive expansion, driven by a trend of returning to traditions, with the reappearance of iconic French dishes at very low prices.”
Created in the 1850s by the butcher Adolphe-Baptiste Duval to fill workers’ stomachs with hearty meals, Duval’s ran 250 restaurants in the capital by the turn of the 20th century.
That made them France’s first mass chain of restaurants, serving traditional recipes at low prices in high-volume and bustling restaurants.
But as eating habits changed, with higher quality and more expensive brasseries dominating the French food market, and international and fast-food trends appearing, the bouillon concept fell out of favour.
Its revival began in 2005 with the resurrection of the Bouillon Chartier, an ornate Parisian landmark that had been slowly fading.
“A bouillon is the gateway to French gastronomy,” explained Christophe Joulie, part of the gastronomic family who took over the Chartier.
He modernised the kitchens and put beef bourguignon with macaroni back on the menu.
“For me, you have to be able to have a starter, main course and dessert for under 20 euros,” he said.
With its leek vinaigrette for one euro and bills scribbled on paper tablecloths by apron-clad waiters, the restaurant hums with activity as locals and tourists alike pack out its tables, which crucially cannot be reserved.
“In a world where fast food is taking up more space, it’s French-style fast food, because we serve a full dish for less than a sandwich at McDonald’s,” said Joulie.
– ‘Dust off’ –
Even multi-Michelin-starred French chef Thierry Marx has got in on the act, attracted by the idea of providing quality food at affordable prices.
He has opened a bouillon in a northern Paris suburb.
“In the 1960s, it took the equivalent of an hour of the minimum wage to eat at a bistro,” he told AFP. “Today, with an hour of minimum wage, you only get fast food, something from the bakery — or a bouillon dish.”
Other restaurateurs with a keen eye for the market have sensed an opportunity.
“We looked at needs and changing habits and realised there was demand for intergenerational social spaces with no price-based exclusion,” Enguerran Lavaud, director of Groupe Bouillon Restaurants, told AFP.
“I wanted to dust off the bouillon -— its mass-market French dishes available from noon to midnight.”
Boosted by its Instagram presence, his Bouillon Pigalle now serves 2,300 customers a day, often with long queues along the pavement.
Since 2017, the concept has spread, attracting more and more restaurateurs across France from Angers to Nancy and Toulouse.
Some are adapting the concept.
In the Romainville suburb northeast of Paris, a family of Mauritian origin took over a large brasserie in 2026 to turn it into a “Mauritian-style bouillon”.
There is an Italian bouillon in Paris too.
Industry insiders say they do not fear competition around what has become a “bouillon culture”.
“But there are bouillons and bouillons: those that can’t sustain the low prices over time, and whose menus change all the time, won’t make it to 2027 or 2028 because you have to protect the quality of the experience to protect volume — and therefore prices,” warned Lavaud.
According to consultant Bernard Boutboul, you specifically need “at least 300 seats and not exceed an average bill of 18 euros”.
Thursday, April 16, 2026
South Korea Has An Oil Problem. Canada Is Helping To Fix It
The Strait of Hormuz blockade and failed Iran talks are triggering global fuel shortages, forcing rationing in multiple countries and driving up energy costs.
Major importers like South Korea are scrambling to diversify supply, with Canadian crude emerging as a competitive alternative due to price and availability.
Canada’s Trans Mountain pipeline is enabling a major shift in global oil flows, boosting exports to Asia and reducing reliane on the U.S. market.
Negotiations for an end to the Iran war have so far failed, and the Strait of Hormuz remains effectively closed.
On Monday, the US military started blockading ships entering and exiting Iranian ports. President Trump said Iranian ships would be “immediately eliminated” if they approach the blockade, which is meant to force Tehran back to negotiations.
At least five countries — Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Cambodia, Bangladesh, and Slovenia — are rationing fuel and implementing mandatory purchase limits to conserve supply.
Major oil-importing nations are seeking Middle East workarounds to preserve a steady supply of oil and natural gas.
Wood Mackenzie, a commodities consultancy, estimates the biggest loser from the Hormuz closure will be South Korea, the world’s fourth largest oil importer, while Italy will be the hardest hit in Europe.
If the war continues and fuel costs remain high all year, South Korea would face a 74% increase in the cost of a kilowatt-hour of electricity, while Italy would see an 80% jump, CBC News reports. Japan and the UK, respectively, could face a 41% and a 27% increase.
Until recently, the United States was the only destination for Canadian crude, buying an eye-popping 96%.
The reason Canada had one single customer for its oil was not out of choice but because most oil pipelines run north-south, to refineries in the US Midwest and the Gulf Coast.
Attempts to build pipelines east to west — Energy East, a proposed line to move Alberta crude to New Brunswick and Quebec, along with the Northern Gateway pipeline that would have run across northern Alberta and British Columbia to tidewater — both failed due to local opposition.
The Americans effectively held Canadian oil hostage. Alberta crude, which is heavy and contains impurities like sulfur, was sold at a discount to the US benchmark WTI, sometimes up to $20 a barrel less.
As a video explains, Billions of dollars evaporated every year, simply because Canada had no exit. That’s the problem Trans Mountain was built to solve.
Everything changed in 2024 with the completion of the Trans Mountain Expansion Project, a twinned pipeline that extended from Edmonton, Alberta, to the Westridge Marine Terminal in Burnaby, a suburb of Vancouver.
When it came online in May 2024, TMX pushed capacity from 300,000 to 890,000 barrels per day. For the first time, Canadian oil could reach the Pacific coast at genuine commercial scale.
Skeptics complained that the ballooning cost of the pipeline — nearly CAD$34 billion — and projected lower demand for oil due to electrification and renewables — would make TMX a white elephant.
That, high shipping fees and the fact that Vancouver’s port could only handle Aframax-class tankers, too small for the VLCC supertankers that Asian markets typically rely on, all seemed to spell doom for TMX.
Then came the re-election of President Donald Trump.
When the mercurial POTUS slapped a 10% tariff on Canadian energy imports in early 2025, it hurt Alberta oil exporters and sent a chill through the Canadian oil patch. Suddenly Canada’s guaranteed energy customer didn’t look so reliable.
Enter TMX, the pipeline many loved to hate, strengthened by a change of direction by the Canadian government in favor of resource development, and diversification of Canadian exports away from the United States.
When the US and Israel attacked Iran on Feb. 28, the Strait of Hormuz, through which 20% of the world’s daily oil supply passes through, was blocked within 72 hours.
South Korea, which gets nearly 70% of its oil supply from the Middle East, suddenly faced an energy crisis. Big Korean refiners like HD Hyundai Oil Bank and SK Energy activated emergency diversification plans. They needed oil, fast. The product needed to be price-competitive, available immediately, and most importantly, didn’t have to run any geopolitical gauntlets.
Canada’s TMX pipeline and the oil stored at Westridge Terminal was seen as a good option because it fit all three criteria. Moreover, Korea was already doing business with the terminal.
To explain, we need to go back to 2023, when Canada exported exactly $0 worth of oil to South Korea — despite sitting on the world’s fourth largest proven oil reserves.
After the TMX pipeline was completed in May 2024, Asian buyers started making enquiries. South Korea was front of the line.
GS Caltex took the first test cargo back in September 2024, 300,000 barrels shared with Japan's ENEOS. HD Hyundai Oil Bank followed with 548,000 barrels in April 2025. SK Energy is currently in long-term contract negotiations.
Total Canadian oil exports to South Korea from May 2024 through September 2025 reached CAD$411 million — from zero to 411 million dollars in under 17 months.
In TMX's first year of operation, Canadian oil exports to markets outside the United States jumped nearly 60%, hitting a record of roughly 183,000 barrels per day. China overtook the US to become the pipeline's single largest customer.
Japan, India, Brunei, Taiwan are all taking deliveries.
Another video source reports that, in spring 2026, Korean refiners facing the worst Middle Eastern supply disruption in a generation began making phone calls that would have seemed absurd just three years ago. Not to Houston, not to Riyadh, to Calgary. A Korean government official overseeing the country's oil imports confirmed the shift in terms that leaves zero room for ambiguity.
Korean refiners are actively bringing in Canadian crude as an alternative supply amid the current inability to secure Middle Eastern barrels.
Back to the three criteria South Korea was looking for, amid the Middle East oil crisis, Canada’s cheap crude, known as Western Canadian Select, beat its competitors on price.
The landed cost of Canadian crude in Korea was $64.65 per barrel as of 2025. American crude, $73.64. Saudi crude, $73.80. Canadian oil is arriving in South Korea nearly $10 cheaper per barrel than the competition.
A spokesman for HD Hyundai Oil Bank confirmed the company plans to gradually increase Canadian volumes going forward. Two of Korea’s largest energy companies, SK Energy and GS Caltex, are also reportedly actively pushing to secure Canadian supply.
While the amount of oil South Korea is importing from Canada is currently small — only about half a percent of total imports — changing trading partners takes time and shipment volumes are incremental.
Consider: Canadian oil exports to Korea went from zero to 4.54 million barrels in just two years. Within the next several years, Canada could be supplying tens of millions of barrels annually. And then there’s this:
Seoul has authorized its refiners to exchange crude imported from non-Middle Eastern countries for government-held Middle Eastern reserves. 20 million barrels are slated for these swaps, with 2 million already released.
This mechanism essentially gives Korean refiners a financial incentive to buy Canadian. The government is actively subsidizing diversification away from the Middle East, and Canada is positioned to be a primary beneficiary.
By Andrew Topf for Oilprice.com
ABS Publishes Leading Whitepaper on Human Readiness Levels for the Industry
“Emerging maritime technologies require qualification processes that extend beyond technical maturity; Human Readiness Levels (HRLs) provide a structured approach that supports safer operations while reducing unnecessary cost and rework.”
That is an excerpt from the latest industry-leading research from ABS, Beyond Technology Readiness: Applying Human Readiness Levels in Maritime Systems, which examines existing gaps in maritime human?system integration and demonstrates how HRLs can be integrated into current maritime qualification processes.
“Technical maturity alone is not sufficient to achieve operational safety. While existing frameworks offer valuable insight into technical maturity, they do not account for the human element that ultimately interacts with, operates, maintains and makes decisions with the technology. In this whitepaper, ABS is providing guidance for owners and vendors to incorporate human factors early so new technologies can be introduced more safely, effectively and with greater confidence,” said Michael Kei, ABS Vice President, Technology.
Technology readiness levels focus on hardware and software performance, while HRLs evaluate: operator roles and responsibilities; cognitive workload and decision authority; interface usability and interpretability; alarm strategy effectiveness; training effectiveness; procedural completeness; and organizational readiness.
The ABS whitepaper builds on existing guidance from the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) and the International Maritime Organization (IMO) and provides HRL maritime application examples for remote inspections, autonomous operations, AI decision support tools and augmented reality devices.
Recent research on maritime autonomous surface ships (MASS) has highlighted emerging risks associated with supervisory control, automation trust, alarm overload and degraded situational awareness. ABS identifies ways to integrate HRLs into maritime qualification processes such as the ABS New Technology Qualification program, SMART notations and verification and validation guides.
The products and services herein described in this press release are not endorsed by The Maritime Executive.
AI-Enabled ETA Management Could be the Key to Solving Port Congestion
An expanding global fleet. Bigger ships. Growing trade volumes. Slower port turnarounds.
Port capacity is under increasing pressure and congestion is a significant challenge – raising operational costs for shippers, disrupting global supply chains and hitting economic activity. But AI-driven predictive ETA management can optimize port turnarounds to ease logistical impacts.
The smooth transit of 90% of global trade carried by sea remains hostage to port congestion stemming from supply-demand imbalances, operational inefficiencies and lagging investments in infrastructure. Weather also has an impact, along with labour issues and logistical constraints such as a lack of crane availability, yard space and inadequate landside transport connections.
Visibility is therefore key for vessel operators to avoid the ‘rush to wait’ at ports. This requires actionable data insights to determine accurate ETAs that can inform speed decisions to save fuel and optimize arrival times.
Counting cost of congestion
Congestion at ports can affect schedule reliability – adding days or weeks to transit times – as well as disrupt industrial production and push up freight rates due to a dearth of vessel capacity, while also increasing demurrage and detention charges. Consequently, carriers may be forced to reroute vessels or blank sailings.
As well as the negative costs and revenue impacts of port congestion, this can result in higher emissions from unplanned idle time at anchorage or suboptimal ETA management leading to higher than necessary speeds, while there are also safety concerns due to crowded waters.
Port congestion is compounded by the productivity demands of modern megaships – with ultra-large containerships discharging and loading 3000-5000 containers per call to extend berth times – that can put a strain on terminal capacity, especially if several such vessels arrive simultaneously.
Ports are also vulnerable to sudden demand surges caused by pre-holiday shipping rushes or global trade upheaval triggered by tariff changes that can lead to front-loading ahead of implementation to boost cargo shipments – causing delays, higher freight rates and congestion.
Port infrastructure issues
For example, berth waiting times can extend to several days during peak periods at Singapore – the world’s second-largest container port by TEU volume – while the European gateway ports of Antwerp and Rotterdam experience seasonal congestion, especially during the peak Q3/Q4 shipping season and when industrial action disrupts operations, according to research firm Kpler.
The biggest challenge is matching port capacity with shipping demand.
There is a lack of transparency about berthing slot availability in relation to expected ship traffic and arrival times, particularly in the container trade and possibly more so in bulkers and tankers. This means a slot may cease to be available for a waiting vessel if a port is working at full capacity, or available berths may not be used if expected vessels fail to arrive.
This leads to sub-optimal port utilization, putting intraport capacity utilization under pressure. Consequently, a port may develop port infrastructure that isn’t really needed. This also results in bottlenecks, slower vessel turnaround times and voyage delays.
Such bottlenecks – when the volume of ships calling at ports exceeds terminal capacity to efficiently process them – cause a domino effect where a delay due to congestion at one port ripples down to other ports on the route to hit entire trade lanes. Local congestion thus becomes global disruption.
S&P Global’s latest global port congestion analysis indicates a general decline in port efficiency globally with decreased port moves per hour, longer arrival processing times and increased average port hours at most ports across five regions – Northern Europe, North-East Asia, North America, South-East Asia and the Mediterranean.
Optimizing port traffic flows with AI
However, port traffic flows can be optimized by leveraging AI-driven intelligence used in smart voyage management that can enable predictive ETAs and earlier decisions on berth planning when there is a transparent flow of information between the port and shipping company.
Predictive ETA management uses AI analytics and advanced algorithms to forecast accurate arrival times based on a range of real-time data inputs – weather, vessel performance, traffic and navigational, and port and terminal operations.
This can enable more efficient planning of port calls through integration of port congestion insights, berth availability data, traffic events and analysis of avoidable waiting time.
Voyage intelligence, which combines meteorological, technical and operational data to predict ETAs, makes it possible to better navigate port call congestion when port information is included in the data stream.
Faster turnarounds, fuel savings
Real-time updates allow dynamic recalculation of optimal routes and speeds based on scenario analysis to determine the best route with the lowest fuel use and optimal arrival window.
One possible scenario is that a vessel could adjust speed 48 hours out to align with an open berth slot, thereby cutting waiting time from 18 hours to zero. It is all about facilitating the shift from a ‘rush to wait’ to just-in-time arrivals.
Ship operators are increasingly using cost-benefit analysis to vary speeds and save fuel within traditional contracts as part of intelligent routing, which can result in faster port turnarounds and savings of 5-8% in fuel and emissions, while also improving CII ratings. This is low-hanging fruit with minimal investment.
'Air traffic control system’ for ports
There is clearly also potential for wider application of smart ETA management to serve as an ‘air traffic control system’ for ports to allow more efficient berth allocation, improved resource coordination and enhanced capacity utilization.
This can provide visibility of all vessels sailing into a port for more precise scheduling of marine operation resources – such as pilots, shore labour and equipment – and better alignment with outbound logistics to avoid unnecessary costs.
Predictive ETA management can alleviate chronic port congestion to deliver measurable gains in shipping efficiency and sustainability – and dramatically improve the reliability of the global supply chain.
The opinions expressed herein are the author's and not necessarily those of The Maritime Executive.
(Article originally published in Jan/Feb 2026 edition.)
PASSENGER SAFETY: A HIERARCHY OF CONTROLS **By Pat Zeitler**
Those in the business of industrial safety are familiar with the concept, "hierarchy of controls."
It's predicated on the belief that health and safety risks are controlled through a hierarchy of actions that can best be described as an inverted cone or pyramid with the most effective control on top, narrowing down to the final and least effective control on the bottom. At the top of the pyramid is elimination, followed by substitution, engineering controls, administrative controls and personal protective equipment (PPE).
Safety professionals who dedicate themselves to cruise ships and ferry boats must implement this system in a way that encompasses both the industrial component of crew and passenger safety as well as the hospitality side of business.
In theory, eliminating hazards is best (step #1). However, many hazards are permissible in this system when the probability, risk or exposure is extremely low. A good example is how the cruise industry reacted during the 2020 Covid outbreak. It simply eliminated the hazard by ceasing operations until the threat of Covid went away. Another example would be a cruise operator not allowing a vessel to get underway due to reports of severe weather.
Step #2 is substitution. This action might be applied to a cruise ship or ferry boat in the form of changing a route (due to any number of factors) or reducing emissions by shifting to alternative fuels or electric propulsion – a substitution intended to mitigate the environmental hazard more than the immediate risk of personal safety.
The remaining three steps – engineering controls, administrative controls and personal protective equipment (PPE) – are tangible and easily recognizable by passengers and crew. This is where companies like Survitec, Consilium, Lalizas and Viking come into play.
ENGINEERING CONTROLS
Engineering controls, in the most simplistic terms, is a modification made or engineered in a way that physically separates the hazard from the person. The key factor is that the worker or passenger will not have to adapt their behavior to the known hazard.
For example, Consilium is a company that has been in the business of fire detection for marine purposes since 1967, long before the concept of a hierarchy of controls even existed. Safety technology is what Consilium is known for, and its newest innovation, SensEye, is a video monitor integrated into Consilium's SMiG automated safety management system and, with the assistance of AI, will notify the crew when abnormalities are detected.
The system monitors passengers and crew, and if a passenger enters a restricted area the system will notify the crew or if someone takes a fall the onboard emergency management system can be activated in real time.
When asked what safety trends Consilium expects to see in 2026 and beyond, Martin Steen, Consilium's Senior Vice President Americas, stated, "AI, AI, AI. We're investing heavily, same as all other leading tech companies. We'll use the AI engine to validate all our detection units such as smoke and heat detectors, flame detectors, gas detectors and – in combination with a HD smart camera – analyze the potential risk onboard. We will guide the crew in making the right decision to save life and values onboard."
Incorporating AI is taking fire detection and suppression to the next level. Detection alone is an administrative control. When combined with response capabilities like fire suppression, equipment shutdowns and emergency management system activations, it looks like the gold standard of an engineering control.
ADMINISTRATIVE CONTROLS
Administrative controls include regulations, company policies, materials that include warning signs and markers and even worksite communication systems. Consilium's safety management software could be considered an administrative control.
The defining characteristic of an administrative control is that it changes a crewmember or passenger's actions in a way that avoids a hazard. Training might be considered the ultimate administrative control, and vessel operators who team with Survitec have a partnership that includes access to a variety of training courses like safety equipment maintenance, lifeboat operator academies and customer-specific courses available upon request.
Survitec is best known for its life rafts and marine survival technology. Tracking and servicing life rafts, immersion suits, lifejackets as well as lifesaving equipment such as davits and fire suppression systems are key administrative controls that Survitec provides for its customers.
"We've seen a strong post?COVID resurgence in cruise?vessel contracting with shipyards," states Richard McCormick, Communications Director-MES &AES. "It's been significant not only for cruise operators but also for the wider network of suppliers that support them. As a result, we've secured record-breaking sales."
The success of 2025 is due in no small part to the newbuild MES (marine evacuation systems) orderbook. Systems like the Life Ark, Martin Ark 2 and Survitec Zodiac Evacuation Slide are setting the standard for passenger safety.
Looking ahead, Survitec is working on advanced automation solutions designed for the small ferry market as well as introducing its newest MES product, the Survitec Seahaven, the world's largest inflatable lifeboat.
PERSONAL PROTECTIVE EQUIPMENT
The last step on the hierarchy of controls is the most tangible and easily recognized one – personal protective equipment or PPE. It's the last line of defense against a hazard.
While items like gloves, safety glasses and hard hats immediately come to mind, PPE for passengers includes things like Survitec Marine Evacuation Systems, life rafts, immersion suits and all lifesaving equipment in general.
Lalizas is another leader in this space.
"At Lalizas, safety isn't simply about products – it's about people and outcomes," says Iasonas Lalizas, Marketing & Communications Director. "In 2026, we continue to build on our legacy by delivering rigorously tested, regulation-compliant lifesaving equipment, partnering with global operators to enhance onboard safety protocols and investing in education and innovation that protect passengers and crew alike. Our mission remains clear: to elevate safety standards across every voyage, from commercial fleets to recreational craft."
PPE for crew and passengers at sea is what Lalizas is all about.
Since the company's inception in 1982, the core product lines of Lalizas have been life rafts, inflatable and foam lifejackets, man overboard (MOB) systems, immersion suits and breathing devices. While staying true to its product roots, Lalizas introduced two new product lines in 2025 – a mini-version of the Lalizas Foam Folding Compact lifejacket, designed to save stowage space on board, and in-house production of pilot and embarkation ladders.
Beyond developing products, Lalizas acquired Ativa Náutica, Brazil's leading lifejacket manufacturer, a move that strengthened its global network in South America.
No survey of maritime PPE would be complete without mentioning Viking Life-Saving Equipment – the world's largest supplier of marine evacuation systems for cruise ships and passengers.
When aboard a ship, there exists inherent risks that cannot be removed or substituted – a fact that Tage Sørensen, who founded Viking Life-Saving Equipment back in 1960, knew very well. He began producing inflatable rubber life rafts for local Danish mariners.
Today, Viking is a synonym for safety at sea. Its product line of lifesaving PPE includes life rafts, immersion suits and firefighting equipment as well as lifeboats, evacuation systems and life jackets. Viking does more for passenger safety than just providing PPE. Its customers rely on Viking for engineering controls like boat davits and evacuation systems as well as administrative controls that include servicing agreements for life rafts and fire control systems.
Personal protective equipment like life jackets, immersion suits and life rafts are what most people initially think of when the conversation turns to passenger safety, and those items are a key component. However, safety at sea – especially as it relates to passengers – must be examined through a multilayered approach like the hierarchy of controls.
Pat Zeitler is Dive Superintendent at Orion Group in Houston.
The opinions expressed herein are the author's and not necessarily those of The Maritime Executive.
AD Ports Sees New Opportunities in Black Sea Market
Barely a month after DP World sold its stake in Ukraine’s Black Sea port of Pivdennyi, another UAE-based operator, AD Ports, has entered the region through an investment partnership in Romania.
AD Ports this week announced that it has signed an agreement with the National Company Maritime Ports Administration SA, the administrator of the Port of Constanta in Romania. The agreement effectively opens the door for AD Ports to pursue development opportunities in the Black Sea’s largest port.
The expansion into Romania aligns with other investments made by AD Ports across Central Asia and Pakistan. AD Ports is positioning itself to lead Eurasian logistics through the ongoing reactivation of the Middle Corridor, better known as the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route (TITR). The historic Silk Road corridor connects China to Europe through Kazakhstan, the Caspian Sea, Azerbaijan and Georgia.
Last year, AD Ports launched the Gulf Link Logistics joint venture with KTZ Express, the freight unit of Kazakhstan Railways. Further, the operator partnered with SEMURG Invest LLP, to develop a grain terminal at Kazakhstan’s Kuryk Port on the Caspian Sea. In addition, AD Ports has also inaugurated an intermodal logistics hub in Tbilisi, Georgia.
Now with access to the Port of Constanta, AD Ports significantly raises its influence on the logistics networks along the Middle Corridor. Positioned at the mouth of the Danube-Black Sea Canal, Constanta provides a vital maritime link between the Black Sea shipping routes and inland waterways serving Eastern and Central Europe. Notably, the port handles significant volumes of agricultural products such as grains and cereals from Eastern Europe and Central Asia.
As a fully integrated multimodal hub, connecting sea, rail, road and river networks, Constanta is the major trade gateway on the Black Sea. In 2025, the port handled 88 million tons of liquid, dry and general cargo, as well as approximately 1 million TEU of container traffic.
AD Ports' close competitor DP World exited the region a month ago to enter the Russian market. The exit came after the Ukrainian port operator TIS Group acquired the 51% stake of DP World in the container terminal of the Black Sea port of Pivdennyi. At around the same period of exit last month, it was revealed that DP World would create a joint venture in logistics with Russia’s nuclear giant Rosatom. The deal was valued at around $200 million, with Rosatom holding 51% of the company and the other 49% going to DP World.
Rosatom’s contribution to the venture would be its 92.4% stake in the Russian shipping company FESCO, which it controls. DP World would provide cash based on the market valuation of FESCO. Rosatom said that the deal would help it access DP World’s global infrastructure. DP World on the other hand is expected to assist Russia find new cargo volumes, including new users for the Northern Sea Route (NSR).
Thursday, April 09, 2026
How do plant roots grow in unpredictable temperatures?
Salk Institute scientists uncover an internal “thermostat” that lets plants sense temperature and adapt growth, opening potential new paths to more resilient crops
LA JOLLA (April 9, 2026)—Plants can’t move to escape the heat like humans can—they are forced to adapt. As temperatures fluctuate, one key survival strategy is the ability of roots to keep growing, allowing plants to access water and nutrients further away in the soil. But how do plants sense temperature and translate it into growth?
Salk Institute scientists have uncovered a new answer in a familiar plant hormone: auxin. Auxin is at the center of plant growth, governing everything from cell elongation to root and stem development. But it’s not the center of this story—instead, the latest research found auxin’s partner proteins serve as internal plant “thermostats.” These partner proteins directly sense temperature, then change genetic programs to direct root growth accordingly.
The findings, published in Nature Communicationson March 27, 2026, could be used in future efforts to engineer plants that withstand more extreme temperatures.
“It’s been known for a long time that plants grow at different rates at different temperatures,” says Lucia Strader, PhD, senior author of the study and a professor and holder of the Howard H. and Maryam R. Newman Chair in Plant Biology at Salk. “Now we have discovered this protein that can directly sense temperature and consequently adjust root growth, which is a huge step toward understanding how plants integrate environmental cues into life.”
A growth signal with a “Goldilocks” problem
Auxin is a master regulator of plant growth—and it’s also a bit like Goldilocks. Strader explains that “it has to be just right, because too little or too much can inhibit growth.”
For decades, scientists thought that temperature influenced plant growth mainly by altering hormone levels, such as auxin. Scientists have long known that warm temperatures increase both auxin levels and root growth—but that creates a paradox, since high auxin typically slows root cell elongation.
So, what else could be controlling root growth in response to temperature?
An internal thermostat and protein reservoir in plant cells
Auxin acts through Auxin Response Factor transcription factors (ARFs), proteins that regulate the expression of growth genes. The team discovered that these ARFs directly sense temperature. At cooler temperatures, ARFs are stored in inactive clusters inside the cell, like a reserve. As temperatures rise, the proteins become more soluble, dissociate from these clusters, and move into the nucleus, where they activate growth-related genes.
“You have this reservoir of protein that can be activated depending on the environment, and temperature allows the cell to shift more of that protein into an active form,” says first author Edward Wilkinson, PhD, a former graduate student researcher in Strader’s lab at Duke University. "We think this is something to do with the properties of the protein itself—at higher temperatures, it is more stable and more soluble, so it can readily accumulate and drive temperature responses."
This system allows plants to respond quickly to environmental changes by redistributing existing proteins rather than making new ones. “You can think of it as a built-in thermostat within the cell—a very clever way to regulate growth,” adds co-first author Katelyn Sageman-Furnas, PhD, a postdoctoral researcher in Strader’s lab at Duke University.
This dynamic system gives plants a powerful advantage. Instead of making new proteins from scratch, they can rapidly adjust growth by redistributing proteins they already have.
Why does temperature sensing matter in crops?
Understanding how plants sense and respond to environmental stressors is increasingly important for agriculture.
Scientists’ newfound ability to identify molecular components that act as temperature sensors and protein activators opens the possibility of designing crops that continue to grow at higher temperatures.
Because root growth is essential for accessing water and nutrients, this kind of resilience could help protect crop productivity under challenging conditions.
An international collaboration for discovery
The Salk study was published in tandem with a complementary study from the lab of Jorge Casal, PhD, at the Institute for Agricultural Plant Physiology and Ecology (IFEVA) at the University of Buenos Aires. After meeting at a conference, Strader and Casal decided to create distinct research plans with one shared goal: to uncover how plants turn environmental signals into growth.
“This kind of discovery really represents Salk’s collaborative spirit, and how our culture encourages relationships within and beyond our campus,” says Strader. “Our cooperation helped optimize resources, getting us closer to understanding plant signaling without competing or wasting time or money.”
Both papers were published on the same day, and Strader and Casal are credited as co-authors on each other’s publications. You can read Casal’s lab’s Nature Communications paper here.
This work was supported by the National Science Foundation, National Institutes of Health, and Duke University.
About the Salk Institute for Biological Studies The Salk Institute is an independent, nonprofit research institute founded in 1960 by Jonas Salk, developer of the first safe and effective polio vaccine. The Institute’s mission is to drive foundational, collaborative, risk-taking research that addresses society’s most pressing challenges, including cancer, Alzheimer’s, and agricultural vulnerability. This foundational science underpins all translational efforts, generating insights that enable new medicines and innovations worldwide. Learn more at www.salk.edu
Seedlings grow longer stems under warmer conditions in a process dependent on auxin and the activity of the Auxin Response Factors (ARFs).
Muscadines, seen growing at the Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station's Fruit Research Station in Clarksville, are a species of native grape that resists many diseases and pests which can impact Vitis vinifera, the species that most people eat as table grapes and drink in wine. The experiment station is the research arm of the University of Arkansas Division of Agriculture.
By John Lovett University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture
FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — Using new genetic markers, fruit breeders can now tell whether grapes will be seedless and self-pollinating even years before vines bear fruit.
The approach will save time and resources in the pursuit of creating flavorful new grape varieties, including the major challenge of developing seedless muscadines on self-pollinating vines.
Margaret Worthington, associate professor of horticulture and director of the Fruit Breeding Program for the Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station, joined colleagues at Cornell University, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Gardens Alive! and E&J Gallo Winery in publishing a study validating a system for predicting flower sex type and seedlessness in muscadines and other grapes.
The study was conducted in association with the VitisGen3 Project and Vitis-x-Muscadinia, which are funded by the Specialty Crop Research Initiative, a USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture federal grant program supporting research and extension efforts.
The researchers made their predictions using a genotyping platform that tests muscadine plant DNA for genetic markers — like signposts in the DNA pointing to specific traits.
The same genetic markers, which are publicly available, can also be used by wine and table grape breeders.
“This is a resource to the global breeding community,” Worthington said.
The experiment station is the research arm of the University of Arkansas Division of Agriculture, and Worthington is also part of the Dale Bumpers College of Agricultural, Food and Life Sciences at the University of Arkansas.
Broadening the scope
Scientists discovered and published the genetic mutations causing seedlessness and male sterility in grapes a few years ago. In this new study, low-cost diagnostic markers targeting those mutations were developed and validated in more than 900 Vitis-Muscadinia hybrid grapes from the Arkansas Fruit Breeding Program and about 200 cultivated and wild grapes.
Isabella Vaughn, a graduate student in the department of horticulture, was the first author.
“She did a great job,” Worthington said of Vaughn. “She scored a lot of plants, coordinated a lot of logistics and helped us to start using the markers in our program.”
KASP, short for Kompetitive allele-specific PCR, is a proprietary but common and cost-effective genotyping platform used to detect specific genetic traits.
The researchers collected leaf samples from the plants, conducted the DNA testing, and then compared the predictions from the DNA testing with what was directly observed on the plants.
Worthington and her team correctly predicted flower sex and seedlessness with 100 percent and 99.7 percent accuracy, respectively.
“We took leaf samples from mature vines with fruit for the validation,” Worthington explained. “The DNA will stay the same regardless of plant age. So, this is proof that it will work for young seedlings, too. We started culling seedlings in 2024 in our applied program and this will be our third year using the markers.”
A century-long breeding quest
Over the past 100 years, fruit breeders have sought to create fertile crosses of muscadines — a native North American grape — with Vitis vinifera, the species behind most commercial table and wine grapes.
Muscadines are prized for their disease resistance, adaptability to the southeastern United States and distinctive flavors. Vitis vinifera offers superior fruit quality, consumer appeal, and seedlessness Worthington said.
But combining the two has proven difficult. Chromosomal differences and compatibility barriers often prevent viable, fertile hybrids, Worthington explained.
“Muscadines are in a different subgenus of grape than Vitis. They’re related, but not that closely related. It’s like a horse and a donkey,” she said.
Like horses and donkeys producing sterile mules, crosses between these grapes often result in infertile offspring.
Muscadines are not widely consumed outside of the U.S. South, but Worthington said seedlessness is key to expanding their appeal, especially for fresh markets and kids.
“What we really want is to make something that has a good size, a dry stem scar so that it can be easily picked, good post-harvest qualities and a really good texture, while keeping that muscadine flavor,” Worthington said.
Despite the challenges in developing fertile, seedless muscadines, extensive traditional breeding efforts have paid off. In 2017, Jeff Bloodworth of Gardens Alive! developed the seedless RazzMatazz® muscadine hybrid grape. That was followed in 2022 by Oh My!®, another seedless muscadine variety that is also powdery-mildew resistant.
Practice makes ‘perfect’
Beyond seedlessness, Worthington also seeks “perfect-flowered” vines for growers to allow for self-pollination and more consistent fruit production.
Wild grape species, including muscadines, are typically dioecious, meaning individual vines produce either male or female flowers. Female flowers require pollen from a nearby male plant to produce fruit. In muscadines, the discovery of two perfect-flowered selections by chance in the mid-20th century provided the foundation for all perfect-flowered cultivars of muscadines grown today.
While crosses between perfect-flowered parents might seem an ideal map to get to that seedless, perfect-flowered muscadine, Worthington said they are not always practical in breeding programs. Muscadines have very small flowers, which makes removing the male parts from perfect-flowered plants and making controlled crosses extremely difficult, Worthington said. The preferred method, to avoid having to do a costly and difficult embryo rescue, is to make crosses between seeded females and seedless perfect-flowered vines.
“The ones we want to keep, we’ll put out in the vineyard at the Fruit Research Station in Clarksville and then we’ll look at those and see how it goes,” Worthington said. “Not everything we keep is going to be good, but the markers tell us if it’s perfect-flowered and if it is seedless. It doesn’t tell us if it tastes good and has a thin skin and it’s productive.”
But, with roughly half as many plants needing to be grown out for field evaluation, Worthington will put more resources into the candidates and make more crosses.
Co-authors included Carmen Johns, research scientist and assistant fruit breeder, and Lacy Nelson, program associate, in the department of horticulture; Qi Sun at the Cornell Institute of Biotechnology at Cornell University; Cheng Zou, formerly with Cornell University; Lance Cadle-Davidson of the USDA-Agricultural Research Service’s Grape Genetics Research Unit in Geneva, New York; Claire Heinitz in the USDA-ARS National Clonal Germplasm Repository in Davis, California; Peter Cousins of E&J Gallo Winery in Modesto, California; and Jeff Bloodworth of Gardens Alive! in Hillsborough, North Carolina.
In the pipeline
Worthington said the Fruit Breeding Program has worked with seedless germplasm since 2017 and has “advanced germplasm in the pipeline” with expectations of a seedless muscadine release in the next few years.
The program released its first two muscadines in 2025: Mighty Fine™ (Cultivar: ‘AM-70′) and Altus™ (Cultivar: ‘AM-77’). Mighty Fine™ is a black, seeded, fresh-market muscadine with excellent flavor and consumer quality to be sold as a fresh fruit like table grapes. Altus™ is also black and seeded but is smaller in size and targeted for wine and juice production. Both varieties stand out for their ability to withstand colder weather compared to other muscadine varieties.
To learn more about ag and food research in Arkansas, visit aaes.uada.edu. Follow the Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station on LinkedIn and sign up for our monthly newsletter, the Arkansas Agricultural Research Report. To learn more about the Division of Agriculture, visit uada.edu. To learn about extension programs in Arkansas, contact your local Cooperative Extension Service agent or visit uaex.uada.edu.
About the Division of Agriculture
The University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture’s mission is to strengthen agriculture, communities, and families by connecting trusted research to the adoption of best practices. Through the Agricultural Experiment Station and the Cooperative Extension Service, the Division of Agriculture conducts research and extension work within the nation’s historic land grant education system.
The Division of Agriculture is one of 20 entities within the University of Arkansas System. It has offices in all 75 counties in Arkansas and faculty on three system campuses.
Pursuant to 7 CFR § 15.3, the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture offers all its Extension and Research programs and services (including employment) without regard to race, color, sex, national origin, religion, age, disability, marital or veteran status, genetic information, sexual preference, pregnancy or any other legally protected status, and is an equal opportunity institution.
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Isabella Vaughn, a graduate student in the Department of Horticulture for the University of Arkansas Division of Agriculture, collects tissue samples used to identify important traits and remove undesirable plants before they are planted in the field.
For gardeners who love colorful, tidy flower beds, helping pollinators doesn’t have to mean going fully wild.
A new study from plant biologists at Northwestern University and the Chicago Botanic Garden found that some cultivated plants — bred for their vibrant blooms, compact forms and visually appealing uniformity — can still provide meaningful support for bees, butterflies and other pollinators.
Among the tested plants, cultivated black-eyed Susan (Rudbeckia fulgida ‘Goldsturm’) and foxglove beardtongue (Penstemon digitalis ‘Husker Red’) attracted pollinators at similar rates to their wild counterparts, while others, such as R. fulgida ‘American Gold Rush’ and P. digitalis ‘Blackbeard,’ performed less well.
While conventional knowledge often suggests that native wildtype plants are best for pollinators, the new findings reveal a reassuring middle ground. Gardeners don’t have to choose between beauty and ecological value. Instead, a thoughtfully planted mix of wild and cultivated flowers may offer a more approachable starting point for people who are new to pollinator gardening.
“Our findings emphasize that ecological value and aesthetics don’t have to be at odds with each other,” said Chicago Botanic Garden’s Nicholas Dorian, the study’s lead author. “There are many people who might be interested in getting involved in the pollinator gardening movement but feel intimidated. Turning a garden or front yard into a wild space can feel daunting. A key takeaway from our study is that cultivated plants with aesthetic appeal can still bring pollinators into your yard and may be a really nice gateway for people who are on the fence or don’t have time or resources to seek out wildtype plants.”
Although pollinator gardens have been around for decades, the movement accelerated in the mid-2000s — sparked by the alarming decline of honeybees. Now, it is a mainstream movement, with millions of pollinator gardens dotting lawns, parks and roadways across the U.S.
“The pollinator garden movement is a somewhat new approach to the conservation of biodiversity,” Dorian said. “In the 20th century, we thought conservation had to take place in big areas away from people — like in national parks or big preserves. But, more recently, we’ve brought conservation back home. That can mean ripping up your lawn to install a native meadow, planting a pot of flowers on your balcony or collaborating with your neighbors to convert the road median into a garden.”
Traditionally, pollinator gardeners have prioritized native, “wildtype” plants — species that grow naturally in the wild without human breeding — and avoid cultivated varieties, or cultivars. Wildtype plants retain their original traits, which were shaped in part by thousands of years of evolution to attract pollinators. Cultivars, on the other hand, are bred not to attract pollinators but to appeal to people. This has led many people to assume that cultivars wouldn’t attract pollinators.
“These days, there is an overwhelming interest in gardening for pollinators,” CaraDonna said. “One of the most frequent questions we’re asked is ‘which plants are best for pollinators?’ Somewhat surprisingly, there’s not a lot of science behind pollinator gardening guidelines, including which plants are best for pollinators.”
From botanic garden to backyard
To help close this gap in knowledge, Dorian, CaraDonna and their collaborators compared how well wildtype plants and cultivars attract pollinators. The study included both controlled experiments at the Chicago Botanic Garden and crowdsourced observations from volunteers across the eastern U.S.
In the controlled experiment, researchers planted four native plant species alongside 13 cultivated varieties in the same plot. Throughout a two-year period, trained ecologists observed each individual plant for 10-minute periods, three times per week. During each observation, they counted the number of insects — including bumble bees, honeybees, butterflies, moths, beetles and others — that visited the flowers’ reproductive features.
To explore whether their results extended beyond a single garden, the research team turned to the public. Through a five-year community science project, volunteers planted the same flowers in backyards, schoolyards and public spaces, and then tracked pollinator visits using the standardized 10-minute observation method.
Not all flowers are equal
The combined results revealed a clear pattern. While the researchers did confirm that wildtypes are consistently the most attractive to insects, cultivars sometimes performed just as well — depending on the variety. Some varieties of black-eyed Susan, beardtongue and aromatic aster attracted pollinators at similar rates to wild plants. But others drew significantly fewer visits.
“None of the plants were completely ignored by insects,” Dorian said. “Wildtypes always had the highest visitation in our study, but some of the cultivars also performed similarly to wildtypes. That means cultivars shouldn’t be dismissed as having no value. That being said, not all cultivars are created equally. Some did underperform compared to the wildtype, and I think that helps to explain why cultivars tend to get a bad reputation among native plant gardeners.”
But even low performers attract more pollinators than lawn grass, which offers virtually no food. That means cultivars, while not perfect substitutes for native plants, can be a useful complement to wildtypes in pollinator gardens. This insight is especially useful because wildtype plants can be difficult to find, while cultivars are widely available at most nurseries and garden centers.
“If you’re trying to attract insects to a green space and all you can find is one of the cultivars that we evaluated, it’ll be certainly better than turf grass,” Dorian said. “It can attract insects and bring them out of hiding.”
A practical path for gardeners
Dorian and CaraDonna emphasize that their study’s findings apply to pollinator gardens and not to ecosystem conservation and restoration projects (where cultivars should not be used). They also underscore that they only studied 13 cultivars and do not have enough information to recommend cultivars that were not included in the study.
“Importantly, none of the cultivars in our study exhibited extra petal production, known as ‘doubled flowers,’” Dorian said. “Those cultivars are best avoided for pollinator-friendly gardens. It’s also important to add that cultivars should never be used for ecological restoration projects. Because cultivars are propagated in a greenhouse, we don’t know how they will interact with wild species.”
Next, the team aims to evaluate a broader range of plant varieties and to better understand which floral traits, such as color and height, drive pollinator preferences. And they hope to continue building support for the pollinator gardening movement.
“We want to empower people to feel they have agency over the future of biodiversity where they live,” Dorian said. “By providing evidence for how anyone can attract and support insects in their own yard, we’re hoping to help keep up the momentum of this really exciting movement to do conservation at home.”
The study, “Evaluating cultivars for pollinator gardens,” was partially supported by the National Science Foundation and The Negaunee Institute for Plant Conservation Science and Action.
An example of a pollinator garden
A bufflehead mason bee visits a foxglove beardtongue.
