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The passing of the Major Port Authorities Bill 2016 was perhaps awaiting just this – the ramping up of efficiency and productivity at the government owned ports before they were conferred more autonomy to impart faster decision making. And since mighty, antiquated pieces of infrastructure have almost closed in on the private ports that had gained the upper hand for a while because of better infrastructure, easy access to finance and faster approvals for big projects, the government had to pass the Bill to make work easy for the dozen major ports.
Since the commissioning of the survey and study by the Boston Consulting Group late last year that visited every port to suggest ways of improving main parameters of port performance, almost all ports have upped the ante and have begun investing heavily in this exercise. Almost 100 projects identified by BCG were taken up by various port authorities to add more capacity, hire or purchase better equipment and hasten road and rail connectivity to improve flow of traffic to and from the port premises.
The capacity addition in major ports for the year 2015-16 was 93.84 MTPA against the target of 92.81 MTPA. A total of 33 projects are proposed to be awarded during 2016- 17 in major ports with an investment of `9,845 crore in addition to the above projects. In addition to this, the government has set a target of 100 MTPA for capacity addition at 12 major ports for the year 2016-17. This will be achieved by completing 29 projects with an investment of `4,815 crore. The Indian Port Rail Corporation Limited (IPRCL) that was set up as a special purpose vehicle to enhance connectivity between ports and the hinterland has a portfolio of 25 projects with a tag of `10,000 crore. It has begun work on eight projects already. The first of them will be to smoothen and decongest rail movement between Odisha’s Paradip and Dhamra ports to the coal fields at Talcher. This, being one of the most busiest routes, always commands a greater number of rakes. At `4,300 crore, this will be one of the most expensive railway connectivity projects undertaken ever. Work on this contract will begin in March 2017. Bids for another 11 projects will be invited in 2017 and 2018.
These connectivity projects come on the back of major capacity expansion plans undertaken by major ports in the last two years. Paradip Port, India’s second largest in terms of cargo, handled plans to double its capacity from 118 mtpa to 300 mtpa in the next four to five years. Other ports such as Ennore, Visakhapatnam and Mumbai ports have called for bids to increase the number of berths and terminals.
Capacity addition has also been supplemented by upgrading soft infrastructure at these ports. The Ministry of Shipping has begun addressing a long standing issue of introducing a system of using less paper work to process permissions required for cargo and vessels to use facilities. It has implemented the Port Community System to integrate the electronic flow of trade related documents, information and functions as a centralised hub for ports of India and other stakeholders like shipping lines, agents, surveyors, stevedores, banks, container freight stations, customs house agents, importers, exporters, railways, CONCOR, government regulatory agencies and other for exchanging electronic messages in a secure manner. The objectives of providing electronic connectivity at ports is to develop a centralised web-based application, which act as single window for the port community members, stakeholders to exchange messages electronically in secure fashion. It will also help in reducing transaction time and cost in port business, achieving a paperless regime in port sector and finally implementing an e-commerce portal for the port community. Staying on the technology front, all major ports have been directed to implement the Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) system to track the movement of men, materials and vehicles within the port premises on real-time basis. Implementation of RFID system will eliminate manual checking of documents at port gate and real-time tracking of movement of vehicles, men and materials. This would reduce congestion and also cost of operations at ports. They have been directed to have the RFID system in place by March 2017.
At least four ports that MG spoke JANUARY 2017 / MARITIME GATEWAY 45 Source: Indian Ministry of Shipping Days, Imports 2015 Days, Imports 2016 Chennai 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 0 Tuticorin Cochin JNPT Source: Ministry of Shipping 2029-30 Paradip Dhamra 2019-20 98.8 52.2 2024-25 153.9 67.8 81.8 191.9 PROJECTED RAIL TRAFFIC TO PORTS (MTPA) KEY MAJOR INDIAN PORTS CUT IMPORT DWELL TIMES to confirmed an increase in their berth productivity, vessel turnaround time and berth-day output. PL Harnadh, Deputy Chairman, Visakhapatnam Port Trust said, “The target set until March 2017 is 61 MT and we’ve clocked in 40.6 MT already. On other operating metrics, our cost per tonne (for handling cargo) is down to `78 compared to `96 last year. The preberthing detention hours are down to 1.18 days as against 1.70 days earlier. Another key number that we are proud to bring to public eye is the fall in average turnaround time from 4.19 to 3.74 days.”
Ennore has a similar story to tell. Its turnaround time has improved by 55 per cent to 3.3 days from 6.9 days and a 25 per cent improvement in throughput of liquid cargo.
Other ports have been making investments on the land side as well mechanising operations and modernising docks. The Mumbai Port Trust is enhancing the ship repair facilities and improving bunkering operations. Both Hughes Dock and Indira Dock will be readied to provide all major repair and maintenance services to ships. The port also says it expects the bunkering business will grow from 200,000 tonnes to 1.925 million tonnes by 2034. Paradip Port currently deploys almost a dozen harbor mobile cranes to discharge coal and other commodities that has helped it handle record per day output of 55,337 tonnes of coking coal in 20 hours and 49,250 tonnes of steam coal in 19 hours. The introduction of the Major Ports Bill now comes as a shot in the arm for all major ports. With the port authorities being given the powers to fix their tariff, these dozen ports could now be ready to set new milestones for themselves.
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