Whilst these numbers come during what is traditionally the slowest part of the annual shipping cycle, they do reflect the severity of the current recession and its impact on the retail industry.

However, Jonathan Gold, NRF's vice president for supply chain & customs policy, said: "The good news is that we've already seen the bottom for the year, and month-to-month numbers are already starting to climb. We're still going to see double-digit declines compared with last year, but the size of the gap is starting to narrow."

The most recent stats available are for February 2009.  US ports surveyed1 handled only 847,832 TEU in February, down 20.6% from 1.07 million TEU in January and down 31.3% from 1.23 million TEU in February 2008.

February was the first time container volumes dropped below the one million TEU mark since February 2004, and volumes were the lowest since 818,342 TEU in March 2002. It also marked the twentieth consecutive month of declining volumes.

Volumes for March are estimated at 930,142 TEU, (down 19.7% from a year earlier), and April is forecast at 987,371 TEU (down 22%). The numbers are expected to rise above the one million mark again in May, but will nonetheless remain well below last year's levels. May is forecast at 1.02 million TEU (down 21.5%), June at 1.06 million TEU (down 18.3%), July at 1.11 million TEU (down 15.6%) and August at 1.15 million TEU (down 16%).

The first half of 2009 is now forecast at 5.9 million TEU, down 21% from 7.5 million TEU in H1 2008.

Total volume for 2008 was 15.2 million TEU, down 7.9% from 16.5 million TEU in 2007 and the lowest level since the 14 million TEU in 2004.

1 US ports covered by Port Tracker: Los Angeles/Long Beach, Oakland, Seattle and Tacoma on the West Coast; New York/New Jersey, Hampton Roads, Charleston and Savannah on the East Coast, and Houston on the Gulf Coast.