Our Speaker
Lalit Raina – Supervisory Trade Specialist, Civilian Agencies, Office of Cargo & Commercial Sealift, Maritime Administration, U.S. Department of Transportation
Lalit Raina supervises the Office of Cargo & Commercial Sealift’s Civilian Agency Team. His office encompasses the Maritime Administration’s (MARAD) predominant mission of strengthening the U.S. Merchant Marine by providing business opportunities to American carriers. In his leadership role, Mr. Raina and his staff are responsible for compelling government-wide compliance with laws mandating the use of American vessels under federal contracts and grant awards where ocean transport is required. His team specializes in civilian federal agencies, providing those agencies and their contractors with logistical support in identifying available U.S. merchant vessels, thus facilitating their compliance with the 1954 Cargo Preference Act.
Mr. Raina serves in numerous other capacities, including in support of efforts to prevent undue foreign influence over the Nation’s global supply chains through engagement with the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States. To this end, Mr. Raina leverages his 30 years of transportation experience to inform Committee decisions on whether to permit transactions whereby U.S. transportation assets would fall under the control of a foreign entity.
After graduating as an Electrical Engineer, Mr. Raina developed an extensive background in the international freight forwarding, logistics, and supply chain management fields. His experience in global logistics stems from leadership roles with project shippers, 3rd party logistics providers, non-vessel operating common carriers, and ocean transportation intermediaries operating across the U.S., Europe, and Asia. He joined the Maritime Administration in 2013 as a Trade Specialist and was promoted in 2018 to supervise the Civilian Agency Team.
Mr. Raina lives in Washington, D.C., with his wife and daughter.
