Source: www.sagarsandesh.com
Chennai Port is more likely to retain the ‘numero uno’ position
in car handling among the major ports in the country in the current financial year
2012-13, latest data released from the port has revealed.
According to official sources, the number of cars handled
as on March 1 stands at 2, 48, 469 units as against 2, 35, 826 handled during
the same period last year.
“After the Madras High Court ban on coal and iron ore
handling, we have focused on many avenues for improving our handling figures
and cars are one among them,” a senior Chennai Port Trust official told Sagar Sandesh.
It may be noted here that the port's nearest competitor –
Ennore Port Limited (EPL) - had handled about 1.04 lakh cars last year and this
year (2012-13), the port is expected to handle about 1.60 lakh car units.
Besides, the port management also pooh-poohed the popular
notion among the EXIM industry that the port, without iron ore and coal
handling, would suffer a huge revenue loss as well as plummet on annual
figures.
“A substantial increase in handling the dry bulk cargoes viz.,
barytes, limestone and dolomite has made good the loss in coal and iron ore,”
the senior official said.
Besides, the Chennai Port also achieved a throughput of
48.66 MT up to February compared to 51.30 MT achieved for the same period
February 2012. However, excluding the throughput of iron ore and coal for the
period ending February vis-à-vis the corresponding period of the previous year,
the throughput is 48.66 MT and 48.06 MT respectively registering a growth of
1.25 per cent, the official added.
Apart from this, the land area rendered surplus due to
the vacation of coal plots measuring about 2, 78, 518 sq.m., since October
2011, has contributed more space for the storage and thereby resulted in
attracting clean cargo for the port.
As the port has been showing better performance on the handling
front, M/s. State Trading Corporation (STC) exported about two lakh tonnes of
wheat through Chennai Port for the first time from October 2012. With these
types of diversified interests to remain in the race, we are expected to handle
more such clean cargoes to compensate the loss in suspending the dusty cargoes,
the official said.
On witnessing the encouraging wheat vessels’ ship day
output, it is reliably learnt that STC plans to export one lakh tonnes per
month through Chennai Port from April.
On the productivity improvement front, the port envisages
to levy half shift gang charges as an effective strategy to improve the
productivity at optimized cost. The physical efficiency of the port has witnessed
considerable improvement ensuring higher standard amidst competitive growth in
the region.
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