Cargo traffic at 12 major ports register 6% surge in April

May 11, 2017: India's 12 major ports marked a 6.27 percent increase in the cargo traffic to 55.75 million tonnes (MT) in April. The surge during the first month of the current fiscal comes in wake of the pickup in demand.

These top ports under the Centre handled 52.46 MT cargo in April 2016. According to the data revealed by the Indian Ports Association, increased demand from sectors like iron ore, coking coal and container traffic resulted in higher movement of cargo last month.

Iron ore traffic volumes were up 40 percent to 5.37 MT during the month as against 3.82 MT in April 2016 while coking coal volumes increased by 15 percent to 4.61 MT.

Container traffic was up 9.78 percent to 7 lakh TEUs (twenty food equivalent units) while POL (petroleum, oil and lubricants) volumes too surged by 7 percent.

Kandla port handled the highest traffic volume at 9.32 MT during April this year followed by Paradip Port at 7.33 MT. JNPT Port handled 5.75 MT, Mumbai 5.33 MT and Visakhapatnam 4.92 MT.

Kolkata Port including Haldia handled 4.23 MT of cargo while Chennai port handled 3.93 MT of cargo. A large portion of India’s cargo traffic passes through the 12 major ports namely Kandla, Mumbai, JNPT, Marmugao, New Mangalore, Cochin, Chennai, Ennore, V O Chidambarnar, Visakhapatnam, Paradip and Kolkata (including Haldia). The ports are responsible for handling at least 61 per cent of the country's total cargo traffic.