After 16 years trading physical freight (chartering) and derivatives (forward freight agreements), Alex Haubert felt the need to enhance his skillsets, by going back to the drawing board, back to academia, and seek renewed inspiration “to prepare for and embrace the next 25 years of my career.”
Alex heads the ocean freight department of Amaggi, Brazil’s largest private farming group, and he signed up for the Class of 2023 of the Executive MBA in Shipping & Logistics (the Blue MBA) to seek out the broadest horizons.
He says: “I was educated in dry bulk – shipping is truly my passion and I wanted to expand my knowledge to other segments such as tankers, containers and offshore while strengthening my finance skills and expanding my ‘toolbox’ in management and strategy.
“I looked at various executive MBA programmes in Europe, and the Copenhagen Business School’s Blue MBA stood out thanks to its strong shipping DNA and its agenda clearly tailored to shipping professionals.”
Taking that step in management education was grounded in ‘real world’ developments. “The pandemic was partly instrumental in the timing of my decision. It was clear we [in commerce] were on the brink of systemic changes on the political and economic front.”
He offers a special note of appreciation to Irene Rosberg (Blue MBA programme director) “who during the interview process gave me the confidence and trust to take the step and engage with a demanding programme.” That initiative designed to benefit his career and his company is working.
“Education is the only attribute that cannot be lost and there is no short-term reward,” he realises, but “The Blue MBA has already changed my day-to-day and there is great potential. The quality of the classes and of the teaching body has opened my mind to different ways and tools to handle the daily and strategic challenges we are facing.
“The diversity and quality of my fellow classmates have changed the lenses through which I look at the industry and the world. I am impressed with the accomplishments and trajectory of my classmates and that makes us eager to meet again at the next module. We only have unfinished conversations!”
He describes shipping as a global yet very segmented industry. “We become expert through specialisation and it is very common to end up operating inside a narrow social ‘funnel’ after a few years. The Blue MBA reopened my horizon.”
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Alex’s employer, Amaggi, produces 1.2m tons of crops a year from its 362,000 hectares, and is globally a leading exporter of soya beans, corn, and cotton. The company is involved in trading 18m tons of grain worldwide in a very competitive environment.
The business requires “a team of people with high competence comprising commodity trading, trade finance, accounting, treasury, cargo operation, vessel operation, chartering and freight trading. All the above allow management of a variety of situations and risks and delivering the cargo within contractual terms”.
Recent huge swings in freight rates have put considerable demands on traders. “The drop in commodity prices and freight rates through the pandemic triggered a buying spree like we have never seen in the past. In 2020, major importers were so concerned with food availability that volumes simply soared. As a company, we had to keep up with volume and price volatility.
“The current high price environment, mainly driven by commodity prices and an expensive dollar, started to exert negative pressure on worldwide demand and ocean freight. Nevertheless, ocean freight remains a strategic component of the delivered price of grains and oilseeds.”
Traders continue to have to cope with major trade disruptions such as pandemic-induced closures of ports, war risks, and commodity supply shortages and bottlenecks. “We came from a world where the cheapest supply chain was the longest. The pandemic snapped the chain and tested the resilience of many organisations.
“Credit is to be given to farmers around the world and especially in Brazil and Argentina. Their industry suffered very limited disruption: farmers kept planting and harvesting, grains moved from the farm to the port.
“The shipping industry also showed impressive resilience with a special note of gratitude to seafarers who really paid a high personal price to keep the world going. The main issues we faced were crew change and port closures at destination due to tight covid policies. This situation fostered congestion which exacerbated the surge in freight rates.
“We are now back to some normality which is already reflected in lower spot rates and a backwardated forward curve [i.e., with the spot price higher than the forward price].”
Alex Haubert asserts that freight derivatives are central to any competitive dry freight operation. Running a grain freight operation involves managing various risks, namely market, basis risk (risk of mismatches in hedged positions), execution, and counterparty. Grain and shipping are not an island. Our markets are heavily affected by worldwide real estate, iron ore, coal markets and macroeconomics in general. Freight derivatives are the only tool available to manage volatility and the market risk associated with our activities.”
In sum, grain originators and traders like Amaggi must have access to a wide variety of tools to be competitive and generate trading volume while managing risk. “That includes relationships and skills allowing us to combine voyage charter, time charter, period charter as well as forward freight agreement trading.”
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Energy transition and efficiency are among the key challenges. The industry must ensure that “ambitious pronouncements and action plans are deliverable within the structure of the organisation. So-called ‘greenwashing’ can sometimes result from absolute good faith and lack of resources.”
Organisations regardless of size or global impact should empower each of their internal layers to engage freely and organically with energy efficiency programmes. They should favour cross-functional communication within the organisation.
“It obviously starts with emission monitoring and tracking. This is where most organisations stand today although at various stages of development. From a charterer perspective, it is only after emissions data has been collected and analysed that action such as fleet optimisation and investments can be undertaken with clear targets and key performance indicators.”
As things stand, “the global political will and the demands of end-consumers combined with high energy prices align the planets towards clear improvements in the way the shipping industry delivers its service across all segments.”
Those who oversee governance should prevent regulation from becoming a deterrent to cooperation between the various stakeholders of a voyage at sea. “An energy-efficiency charterparty clause is not the one that draws the thickest line between owners and charterers but the one that fosters emulation and can eventually be passed on along the charter chain without amendments.
“Various strong initiatives among which are the Poseidon Principles and Sea Cargo Charter, which Amaggi joined in 2022, are testimony to the commitment of the industry. The Swiss Trading and Shipping Association (STSA) is also proactively assisting members in this direction.
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Amaggi was born as a Brazilian family business named after the company’s founder André Antônio Maggi (1927-2001) and is today also present in China, Argentina, Paraguay, the Netherlands, Norway, Singapore, and Switzerland. The company, which employs 8,000 people, reported $485m in adjusted ebitda (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortisation) in 2021. On the logistics side, it runs five ocean port terminals and three river terminals, and a large river barge, pusher, and truck fleet. It manages small hydroelectric power plants and is implanting photovoltaic plants to capture solar energy in its main farms and warehouses. Alex Haubert believes it is the kind of business group where people can benefit from the strengths of the Blue MBA.
Born and raised in Normandy, France, and educated in the US at Bentley University and Boston University, Alex started his career at Barry Rogliano Salles (BRS) shipbrokers in Paris. After three years in Paris, in 2008 he became part of a team to open a Singapore office for the broker. Two years later, he joined Noble Resources as a dry cargo freight trader and moved to Switzerland to assist the development of its freight department. In 2013, he joined Amaggi, setting up with colleagues the destination business and freight operation in Lausanne.
