The Hindu Business Line : Colombo port stir hits cargo transhipment from India

The ongoing strike at the Colombo port is affecting the movement of transhipment cargo from the Indian subcontinent, as 70 per cent of the total transhipment cargo from the country is handled at the port there.

Expressing concern, shippers at Kochi pointed out that the strike, which had started at the Jaya Container Terminal (JCT) at Colombo a week ago, is affecting transhipment of containers to various destinations in the US, European and Far East sectors. Most of the mainline vessels have started omitting Colombo port, which is affecting exports from India badly. They pointed out that even a long deviation of cargo from Colombo to Singapore for transhipment at this juncture is not viable as it is quite expensive and time-consuming. Moreover, most of the mainline vessels do not have a Singapore connection.

It is pointed out that the workers in JCT are on a `go slow' demanding increase in wages, which has resulted in delay in berthing of vessels and handling of containers. According to information available here, there are 10 mainline vessels and nine feeder vessels off the port for berthing and transhipment of cargo arriving from various Indian ports. The productivity at present at JCT is only 4-5 boxes per hour and inter terminal trucking is very poor.

The strike has also affected the arrival of feeder vessels not only to Kochi port but also to the ports of Chennai, Tuticorin and Mangalore. Most of the feeder vessels operating from these ports to the Colombo sector are stranded there.

Kochi port primarily depends on Colombo, as 80 per cent of the transhipment traffic from here is moving through that port.

The strike has resulted in piling up of export cargo at the Rajiv Gandhi Container Terminal at Kochi.

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