News

03/31/2010

Paul Easson Becomes Chairman of Canadian Trucking Alliance

Maritime carrier brings focus of family business, looks forward to tackling challenges.

Paul Easson, president, Eassons Transport of Berwick, Nova Scotia, was elected chairman of the Canadian Trucking Alliance today at the CTA’s annual general meeting, succeeding Alberta’s Bruno Muller of Caron Transport who had served out his two-year term.  Paul Easson is a graduate of St. Mary’s University and a chartered accountant by training. He has worked in the family trucking company, which was started by his father in 1945 hauling apples from Nova Scotia’s Annapolis Valley to other locations in the province, for over 25 years. Today, with offices in Berwick, St. John’s, NF, Moncton, NB and Toronto, ON, the company operates a fleet of over 150 reefer trailers, more than 60 dry vans and 160 tractors, serving truckload destinations to all points in Canada and the USA. An LTL service is also available from Toronto and Montreal, to Atlantic Canada, for dry, fresh and frozen shipments. The company remains very much a family enterprise with Paul’s brothers, Peter and Tom, both holding senior positions.  Paul Easson takes over the CTA chairmanship at a very challenging time for the trucking industry. “The major immediate challenge as I see it is over-capacity,” he says. “That is really depressing the marketplace virtually everywhere in North America.” Over the medium and longer term, however, he says the major challenges the industry will have to contend with include attracting and retaining quality people, environmental sustainability and shifting trade patterns away from the United States. “Of course, being a family business, I see succession planning to be a major challenge for many family-owned trucking companies,” he adds.  He believes that CTA already does, but can continue to, assist carriers in each of these areas, not only through its advocacy efforts, but by creating a forum for carriers from across the country to develop the tools and best practices that will help not only individual carriers but the industry as a whole to become better able to manage the challenges it faces.  “I am also a great believer not only in terms of what CTA can do for the industry, but what the individual members of the Board of Directors and the provincial associations can do for CTA,” he says. “It is imperative that all board members understand that by serving on the CTA board that they have a responsibility to CTA, not just their provincial association. I am looking forward to working with the board and the staff to encourage that engagement.”   Paul and his wife Cindy reside in Berwick and have three children. He is an avid pilot, and enjoys fishing and hunting. Paul is a former chairman of the Atlantic Provinces Trucking Association, and a recipient of the APTA’s Service to Industry Award. He is active in the Berwick District Community Association, the Nova Scotia chapter of the Canadian Association of Family Enterprises, the Waterville Municipal Airport and the Morristown Baptist Church.