Kochi invites bids for logistics park

The Cochin Port Trust has invited fresh bids for leasing of 7.5 hectares close to the International Container Transhipment Terminal on Vallarpadam Island, reported The Hindu.

The land is being leased out for 30 years for the development of a cargo and logistics park.

The cargo and logistics complex will go to serve the international container terminal, which has no adequate container freight station (CFS) space right now.

Lack of CFS space has led to relatively slow movement of boxes landing the export-import community in some trouble.

At a meeting of stakeholders regarding the operations of the new container terminal early last month, the port authority assured that more space would be made available on Vallarpadam Island for handling export-import containers.

The port trust has already augmented its CFS and pre-stage facilities on Willingdon Island. A pre-stage facility to control the processing time for export containers has also been launched at the Ernakulam wharf, which acts as a single-window processing facility for customs clearance.

To solve the problem of Container Freight Station space on Vallarpadam Island, the port authorities had also mooted the idea of movement of containers to and from Willingdon Island using the rail line.

The Container Corporation of India (Concor) has already agreed to the proposal. The service is likely to be announced any time now.
(Source:http://www.cargonewsasia.com)