Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications
Thursday, Jul 07, 2005
Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications Thursday, Jul 07, 2005 |
|
|
|
|
|
Logistics
-
Shipping Concor should have competitor: Study Trade seconds; Concor counters Amit Mitra
Mumbai , July 6 AS the country's container trade surges, pressure is once again mounting on the Government to break the monopoly of Container Corporation of India (Concor) in the realm of freight movement. The Concor monopoly debate has surfaced in port and shipping circles in the wake of the just-released report on `Diagnostic study of Jawaharlal Nehru port', which, among other things, has pointed out that it was important to have at least one competitor to Concor. While most in port and shipping circles are in tune with this recommendation, Concor still feels that introduction of more than one train operator could have an adverse affect on handling capacity. The study was undertaken with the chief intention of suggesting some long-term and short-term measures to avoid occurrence of congestion at JNPT, which was badly affected by the problem some months ago. Going by projections, the two terminals at JNPT are likely to handle a throughput of three million TEUs this fiscal, which may increase to 4.5 million and 5.29 million TEUs by 2007-08 and 2008-09 respectively. And for this, the number of rakes that would be required is over 23 per day by 2008-09. Citing inadequate supply of rakes by Concor as one of the factors that has made JNPT vulnerable to congestion, the report said introducing a competitor to Concor would make "container movement by rail more customer-oriented than it is right now". It also pointed out that even if a framework were to be put in place for competitors to enter the market, the entry barriers would be high due to the large infrastructure base that Concor enjoys. "It may be important to think of even breaking up Concor into two or three entities, which can effectively compete with each other," it said. Pointed out a representative of the Mumbai & Nhava Sheva Shipping Agents Association (MANSA): "We agree that competition to Concor should be encouraged. One solution could be to break up Concor's regions into independent operating companies. But in as much as the Government will retain sizable if not majority equity stake in the new entities, this may not result in true competition." The association also feels that shipping lines, terminal operators and other related companies be allowed to operate their own container flat-cars on the network of Indian Railways. Central Warehousing Corporation (CWC), which has been trying to be a part of the container freight market for the last many years, also understandably concurs with this view. "Obviously, it (competitor to Concor) would look forward to a level playing field so that the competition is fair," the CWC feels. Commenting on this recommendation, Concor has maintained that the report has not examined the likely effect of introducing more than one train operator on the handling capacity available at JNPT. "Having multiple operators would lead to diversion of existing traffic on basis of operations also. Further, this will multiply the number of mixed trains and hence aggravate the problem at JNPT. In our view, even the stacking capacity inside ports is not adequate enough to cater to multi terminals/operators stacking," Concor feels. Concor also feels that attributing the entire blame for congestion at ports on non-availability of adequate rakes is not correct. "Factors, such as traffic handled at JNPT vis-à-vis planned capacity and handling performance of JNPCT and NSICT, have been ignored. The fact that JNPT handled an average of 323 rakes per month during April and August 2004 (congestion period), as against 299 trains per month in the corresponding period of previous year has also been ignored," it pointed out.
Article E-Mail :: Comment :: Syndication :: Printer Friendly Page
|
Stories in this Section |
|
The Hindu Group: Home | About Us | Copyright | Archives | Contacts | Subscription Group Sites: The Hindu | Business Line | The Sportstar | Frontline | The Hindu eBooks | The Hindu Images | Home |
Copyright © 2005, The
Hindu Business Line. Republication or redissemination of the contents of
this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of
The Hindu Business Line
|