Sri Lanka’s Colombo Port records 19.8% growth in container transshipment volume sin the first six months of 2018
The key port in Sri Lanka, the Port of Colombo has reportedly recorded a 19.8% growth, 2.7 million containers, in container transshipment volumes in the first six months of 2018.
The Sri Lanka Ports Authority (SLPA) has issued a statement announcing the Colombo Port’s latest achievement.
“The Port of Colombo expects to reach the seven million TEU (twenty-foot equivalent container unit) target by the end this year,” SLPA has said in a statement.
Transshipment container throughput at the state-owned Jaya Container Terminal (JCT) of SLPA grew 20.6% to 935,848 TEUs in the first half in 2018 as against the same period in 2017, the statement has further noted.
New initiatives would be taken to promote the Port of Colombo internationally, together with all stake holders and to attract more new shipping lines that work in alliances, the statement has also quoted Sri Lanka’s Minister of Ports and Shipping Mahinda Samarasinghe as saying.
According to reports, the SLPA has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with all terminals of the Port of Colombo, that JCT), the South Asia Gateway Terminals and the Colombo International Container Terminals to operate collectively to promote the port.
SLPA Chairman Parakrama Dissanayake has reportedly said that the terminals would compete with each other but would also co-operate with each other, moving between competition and co-operation.
“On the Asia to Europe sector there are 17 loops of which only 03 are calling Colombo,” he has been quoted as saying.
“Therefore, obviously, we have got challenges to ensure that collectively we should attract more loops into the Port of Colombo. This means, we have to go beyond the partisan approach of promoting our terminals to protect the Port of Colombo.”
OSL take:
The Sri Lankan government’s target of making the Colombo Port a hub in the Indian Ocean region is now becoming closer with the growth recorded in the handling of transshipments. Given Sri Lanka’s geographical positioning in the Indian Ocean region as well as the constant development of infrastructure at the Colombo Port, the number of large shipping lines engaging with the port has seen an increase. The growth drive at the Colombo Port and the Sri Lankan government’s blue-green economic policies have resulted in the creation of many investment opportunities in the country’s ports and shipping sector.
| Article Code : | VBS/AT/20180725/Z_7 |