Mumbai port shipments at all-time high of 52.3 mt

Mumbai port shipments at all-time high of 52.3 mt
Our Bureau
Mumbai April 3 "Our critics may now keep mum. Five years ago they said the Mumbai port is dying. Now its throughput has more than doubled, surpassing all the targets," said Mr A.K. Bal, Deputy Chairman of Mumbai port.
In the just ended fiscal 2006-07, Mumbai Port handled 52.36 million tonnes of cargo, the highest ever in the history of the port, as against 35.19 mt in the previous year.
According to Mr Bal, Mumbai could achieve a higher throughput — 18.5 per cent over the previous year — as the port has been responsive to the changing traffic pattern.
Switch from box cargo
"When the container traffic started slowing down (to 1.38 lakh teus from 1.56 lakh teus), we focused on bulk, POL and general cargo. It was the port's ability to handle multi-cargo traffic that enabled Mumbai to achieve this growth, he said.
All types of bulk and general cargoes registered a significant growth. POL up by 15.80 per cent, iron and steel 11.18 per cent and motor vehicles up by 68.28 per cent. Wheat and sugar recorded manifold rise in volume.
The port achieved single-day productivity record in handling sugar (5,202 tonnes in bags), wheat (6,603 tonnes), steel (7,611 tonnes) and coal (17,200 tonnes).
Special facility
Mr Bal said Mumbai has created a special facility for handling project exports, i.e. shipment of large equipment and offshore installations. "We'd improved road and rail connectivity, facilitating easy movements of cargo in and out of the port. At the same time, we could also attract higher coastal traffic," he said.
Higher productivity has also boosted the port's operating surplus. According to provisional figures, operating surplus increased to Rs 228 crore from Rs 178 crore in the previous year.
However, Mumbai port may have to make a large provision for payment of arrears to employees.
The port has plans to set up an offshore container terminal and an oil jetty. Tenders have also been called for creating a modern cruise terminal to handle the growing number of cruise ships.