The Union Minister for Shipping, Mr G.K. Vasan, today said that the Ministry had formulated “a package to promote Indian shipbuilding industry”, which would be taken to the Cabinet “very soon”.

Alongside, the Ministry is also working on a new policy to promote coastal shipping, he said.

Speaking at a ‘Ports and Maritime Investment and Business Conclave', organised here by the Confederation of Indian Industry, Mr Vasan said that the Ministry also intended to develop the Colachel port (in Kanyakumari district, Tamil Nadu) “in collaboration with the Government of Tamil Nadu”.

He pointed out that the deep-draft Colachel port is strategically located close to the international maritime routes.

Mr Vasan also recalled that the recently-released Maritime Agenda, 2020 — a vision document — had set some important goals.

These include increasing port capacity to 3.2 billion tonnes, which will require an investment of Rs 3,00,000 crore., raising Indian tonnage four fold to 43 million GT and enhance Indian's share in global shipbuilding to 5 per cent and the share of Indian seafarers to at least 10 per cent.

In the deliberations that continued after the Minister left, many participants, including Mr S. Hajara, Chairman and Managing Director, The Shipping Corporation of India, said they thought the Maritime Agenda, 2020, was more a wish-list than a clear-cut road map to meet the goals set.

A key point made to back this view was the absence of any programme to train people into the shipping business.

While one participant said that the industry would need some 50,000 seafarers (such as captains, engineers), another noted that the sector would need not just seafarers, but also an army of people for supporting industries

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