Transshipment container traffic: ICTT sets record

Kochi: In a major achievement towards making Kochi a transshipment hub of the country, the Cochin Port Trust (CPT) has managed to garner the highest-ever transshipment container traffic of 1.56 lakh TEUs (twenty foot equivalent unit) at the International Container Transshipment Terminal (ICTT), Vallarpadam, in the 2021-22 financial year by overcoming the disruptions caused by the successive waves of Covid-19 pandemic.
According to the data provided by CPT, the transshipment recorded in ICTT in the 2020-21 financial year was only 86,761 TEUs and it has almost doubled this year.
The ICTT was developed with a vision to boost India's container transshipment and check rising outflow of transshipment containers to Colombo. But the terminal was in troubled waters for various reasons since its commissioning in 2011. Despite having a dedicated road and rail connectivity and a terminal with 145m draft, the terminal has operated at an average 50% usage of the total container handling capacity.
CPT chairperson M Beena said that the aggressive pricing strategy helped ICTT achieve the record traffic of transshipment container. “There are two factors which led to the increase in the traffic. There is a global trend of increasing freight rate and it has led to the congestion of freight traffic at Colombo port, which leads to the diversion of vessels to the Cochin port. Reasonable price is another major factor that attracts more vessels to our port. We are planning to continue with the same strategy in the coming years also,” she said.
It is also to be noted that CPT had a remarkable performance in 2021-22 by handling a record cargo volume of 34.55 million metric tonnes (MMT), registering a growth of 9.68% over 2020-21. In container handling, CPT secured fourth position amongst all major ports in the country by recording highest ever throughput of 7.36 lakh TEUs, a growth of 6.65% over 2020-21.