Jawaharlal Nehru port sets yet another record

The turnaround time of ships at the container terminals of Jawaharlal Nehru port has come down to 22 hours equivalent to less than a day (0.9 days) setting a global benchmark in container cargo handling.  Last month the terminals recorded highest performance of over six million TEUS for the financial year 2022-23 highest among the container terminals in the country.

JNPA was able to achieve the feat due to various measures taken in reducing the dwell time. Most importantly the operational efficiency of the terminal operators has been the biggest contributor along with the better landside- rail and road connectivity, introduction of Centralized Parking Plaza (CPP), Digitization of the processes; streamlining berthing and unberthing of vessels; deploying more tugs for smooth transition of the vessel etc. are some of the other initiatives that JNPA has undertaken to facilitate efficient functioning of the port.

Chairman of JNPA Sanjay Sethi, said, “This is exciting news for all of us at JNPA. Just last month, we achieved a record of handling 6.05 million TEUs in 2022-23, the World Bank data reiterates that our efficiency parameters are better than many countries as per LPI 2023 report and we as a team are committed to further reduce the logistics cost and time for the EXIM trade.”

JNPA started its container handling less than two decades ago while Container handling was introduced in chennai port way back in 1980. But ports in Chennai handled less than 2 million teus last year. This is because vastly superior infrastructure in JNPA, increased dependence on rail transportation with the railway implementing dedicated freight corridor at a cost of rs two lakh crores. On the contrary the ports in Tamil Nadu depend on road transport to the extent of 90 per cent to evacuate goods since the railways and CONCOR play a minimal role in logistics.