ECONOMYNEXT – Container transshipment volumes at Sri Lanka’s Colombo port grew 19.8% to 2.7 million containers in the six months to June 2018 from a year ago, the Sri Lanka Ports Authority said.
“The Port of Colombo expects to reach the seven million TEU (twenty-foot equivalent container unit) target by the end this year, it 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 said.
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 quoted Minister of Ports and Shipping Mahinda Samarasinghe as saying.
The SLPA has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with all terminals of the Port of Colombo, that JCT), the South Asia Gateway Terminalsand the Colombo International Container Terminals to operate collectively to promote the port.
SLPA chairman Parakrama Dissanayake 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 said. “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.”
(COLOMBO, July 23, 2018)