Status change bodes well for port as shippers increase dock activity.

The Port of Hueneme is poised for growth, yet it will probably remain a specialist port for the foreseeable future.

The 80-acre port has become entrenched more than ever in its historically strong commodities -- automobiles and fresh produce. Import and export of those two commodities accounted for 62 percent of the port's tonnage during the first 10 months of fiscal 1992. That's up from 41 percent the prior year, according to port statistics.

One reason for the entrenchment was Southern California Edison's decision to burn more natural gas in the Southland. SCE's switch from fuel oil caused its oil imports into the port to drop to zero from 69,000 tons during the first 10 months last year.

But far more importantly, port officials are forging deeper relationships with their traditional customers, like BMW and Jaguar, which use no other port on the West Coast, and those that promise a natural fit, like Sunkist Growers Inc., said port officials.

Next year Sunkist plans to export all of its Asia-bound refrigerated cargo out this postage-stamp-sized port, 54 years old but with only one one-hundredth the acreage of the Port of Los Angeles in San Pedro.

Sunkist is waiting to make use of the largest on-dock refrigerated storehouse on the West Coast, to be built at Hueneme in a joint venture between the port and Sunkist's steamship line, Cool Carriers of Stockholm, Sweden. The $10 million-plus project is currently being engineered, with construction bid requests going out in August for completion estimated by October 1993, according to Port Executive Director Anthony Taormina.

Nailing the world's largest marketer of fresh citrus was a coup for the port, which specializes in serving chartered ships, or "tramps," the for-hire ships that are favored by auto and produce shippers. Such vessels tend to take cargo on pallets or on its own wheels, and they fit easier into this smallish port, compared with the oil supertankers and giant containerized-cargo ships for which the ports of Long Beach and L.A. are famous.

Key to wooing the Sunkist account away from the Port of Long Beach, its current port, was Port Hueneme's newly acquired status as an official U.S. Customs Service Port of Entry within the Los Angeles Customs District. Essentially, any cargo destined to cross the docks at Port Hueneme can now be inspected and cleared by customs officials there.

Previously, the L.A. Customs district director could call any cargo down to L.A. at his discretion. The possible delay of several days or more could eat into a shipment's profit margin and was seen as a drawback to shippers that otherwise might have expanded their operations at Port Hueneme.

The change of status, effective in February, amounted only to a technicality, said Taormina: Only once in seven years could he remember goods being re-routed to L.A., while all others were handled by the sole U.S. Customs officer stationed at Port Hueneme.

But there lingered "a nagging worry" among importers, said Taormina. To win the U.S. Customs status, a port must prove at least 300 ships call each year, and Port Hueneme was handling about 250. A meeting with U.S. Customs, port officials and Cool Carriers convinced the feds if they gave a green light Cool Carriers would do at least 100 moorings itself.

"I don't think we would have gotten Sunkist or the Australian meat account without it," said Port Harbor Commissioner Stanley J. Daily, referring to a second decision by Cool Carriers to begin importing meat from Australia into Port Hueneme beginning July 1. Meat will be moved a short distance to a U.S. Department of Agriculture inspection station in Oxnard and then divided up into smaller shipments bound for different regions of America.

If Cool Carriers finds Port Hueneme to its liking, said Taormina, it will probably re-route from its current port of entry (Philadelphia) and increase meat traffic through Port Hueneme up towards 90,000-100,000 tons per year.

Winning port-of-entry status "clears up impediments to marketing the port," said Taormina.

"I've said for many years we've been sitting on a powder keg ready to explode here, and I think the fuse is lit right now," said Daily, commissioner for 17 years.

Snagging Cool Carriers was made easier, claimed Daily, by a recent 21-member trade delegation of port, city and business leaders to the giant carrier's Stockholm headquarters.

Now, port officials are moving to garner other goodies that come with their new status. For starters, they have been asked by their auto accounts to look into establishing a U.S. foreign-trade zone nearby, said Taormina. Such government-sanctioned compounds are duty-shelters. Importers may avoid paying duties on imports that are brought to the zone for modifications, labeling, inspection and the like, after which they are re-exported.

Also, Port Hueneme is now more likely to get more U.S. Customs officers stationed there permanently. "We see the potential for four or five additional people here" to do routine examinations, security and surveillance tasks, said Taormina. That, however, hinges on a federal decision to appropriate the funds, and that is not guaranteed, even if traffic grows substantially.

In fact, tonnage was down 15 percent during fiscal 1992's first 10 months. That was largely due to losing SCE oil and a cereal-grain deal to Arab buyers, said Taormina. Despite these losses, revenues for the year are projected to climb 3 percent above last year.

Daily is quick to point out Port Hueneme is "somewhat diversified." Not all of its activity is in food and cars. Procter & Gamble imports wood pulp from Brazil, which is moved to its nearby paper plant in Oxnard to become Charmin toilet paper. Taormina expects P&G's roughly 23-tons-a-year load will double in three years.