Category Archives: Shipping

Chander Agarwal, Managing Director, TCIEXPRESS, shares, “Timely implementation of GST would result in absorption of various taxes involved in transportation of goods and services and will increase efficiency in our operations. Last year, Rs 2.31 lakh crore was announced to be invested in infrastructure, which shows the importance of upgrading infrastructure. Hence, will look forward to some emphasis on improving the infrastructure this year as well as it is a boon not only for express delivery players but many industries. Thirdly, with the recent implementation of demonetisation, the industry is moving towards a digital and cashless mode of transaction. Hence, more incentives for every cashless transaction are expected. This will motivate increased adoption towards technology. Lastly, it will be interesting to look forward to more schemes under Make in India, Skill India, and Digital India initiatives.”

At least six new mega ports have been cleared to be built under the ambitious Sagarmala Project, taken up by the Ministry of Shipping. The National Perspective Plan (NPP) for the much talked about project envisions these new infrastructural facilities as part of its multi-pronged strategy to enhance India’s cargo handling capacity. The Ministry of Shipping’s project, that aims to modernise India’s ports, is estimated to save up to Rs 40,000 crore per year spent on logistics by key industries. The new ports will also boost up coastal shipping, thus decreasing the dependence on transportation through railways and roadways. This is likely to cut down the inland transportation costs by up to 80 percent. Presently the country has 12 major ports.

As per Maersk Line, India maintained its strong trading position with the United Kingdom (UK) registering a 6 per cent year on year growth in EXIM container trade volumes for the first half of 2016. This despite a 2 per cent decline in the UK’s EXIM container trade volumes with the rest of the world during the same period. The full year container trade volume growth forecast for 2016 is expected to slightly lower at four to five per cent, but better than the three per cent growth witnessed in 2015. In terms of overall trade, India ranks 3rd on EXIM trade volumes with the UK with a share of six per cent behind China (38 per cent) and USA (8 per cent).

Sri Lanka has invited Indian companies to participate in its port development projects and other infrastructure building programmes. Ranil Wickremesinghe, Prime Minister, Sri Lanka has discussed the prospects of Indian companies in building two to three Ports in Sri Lanka in his meeting with Nitin Gadkari, Union Shipping and TransPort Minister. The Sri Lankan Prime Minister wants Indian companies to develop a few Ports in Sri Lanka including Colombo Port. Gadkari conveyed his willingness to partner and cooperate in developing their Port and other infrastructure, a Road TransPort Ministry official informed. Indian subcontinent is playing a vital role in the business of Colombo Port accounting for 70 to 75 per cent of its trans-shipment business. Earlier, Gadkari had said that India is set to build a sea-bridge and tunnel connecting Sri Lanka and the Asian Development Bank is ready to fully finance a bridge building project connecting Rameshwaram to Sri Lanka.

The shipping ministry has acknowledged 37 of the recently notified 106 inland waterways to develop them for transport of cargo and passengers in the next two to three years. These include rivers in Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Goa, Assam and West Bengal. “Eight of these waterways have high potential and are financially viable for development. We have already initiated works for developing these waterways. The rest will be taken up in the next two phases,” said, Amitabh Verma, Chairman, Inland Waterways Authority of India (IWAI).

CaroTrans has announced a new direct weekly LCL service from Atlanta to Nhava Sheva, India. This service is aimed to address increased demand from the U.S. Southeast and Gulf regions. The service offers 38 days transit times from the Gulf and 33 days from Southeast. At destination, shipments are securely handled and deconsolidated by Globelink WW India (CaroTrans’ dedicated partner) which provides full India market penetration serviced from 15+ inland container depots. “Flexible, direct LCL services provide logistics service providers with secure, consistent transportation options to serve the varying needs of their customers. We’re committed to delivering reliable U.S.-India trade LCL services,” said Greg Howard, CaroTrans, CEO.

Transindia Logistics, part of Allcargo Logistics has bagged the contract to manage and operate Central Warehousing Corporation’s (CWC) Container Freight Station (CFS) in Mundra, Gujarat. The CFS facility is located in close proximity to an existing CFS operated by Allcargo. With 40 acres of sprawling space, Transindia is poised to transform the way operations are conducted in Mundra. Adarsh Hegde, Joint Managing Director, Allcargo Logistics, said, “Our growth strategy for CFS business lead to the acquisition of Transindia Logistics a few years ago. We are glad to expand our operations with our second facility in Mundra, which is set to transform the business scenario. Coupled with the highest safety and security standards, our customers can expect speedy turnaround, expertise in handling business operations in the western region of India hereon.”

“Currently in India we have achieved approx 50 per cent containerisation and eventually we need to reach the level of 70-80 per cent which the developed countries have already achieved. The size of multimodal logistics for EXIM cargo in India is approx four million TEUs, we have had 18 continuous months of drop in exports, however the ports volumes are marginally up by four per cent, which means that there is an increase in imports. Hence, the current growth rate is apex two per cent which is likely to increase in coming years,” says, Vivek Kele, President, AMTOI.  

India and the United States have agreed to deepen the scope of cooperation in the maritime sector with the American ports evincing keen interest in comprehensive port-led development, especially the ambitious Sagarmala programme. The 150 projects under this programme have the potential to mobilise $50-60 billion of infrastructure investment and another US$ 100 billion of investment for promoting industrial growth. The Shipping Minister outlined the regulatory assistance which the Narendra Modi government has offered to the maritime sector, including grant of infrastructure status to shipyards, supportive domestic eligibility criteria for Indian shipyards for assured ship repair orders, service tax exemption on ship repair service for foreign going vessels, setting up of ship repairing business immediately without any approval from director generals.