Kandla port to become nation’s crude import hub

Kandla port is all set to emerge as an Asian giant with its massive expansion programmes, said its chairman PD Vaghela while addressing his first press meet in the new financial year on Friday. “We will emerge as the crude handling hub of the country in the current financial year with our aggregate capacity of 75 million tonnes per annum,” he said.

The press conference was called to mark the emergence of this port as the numero uno in handling export-import cargo in 2008-09.

"The year 2008-09 was a golden one as unprecedented developmental programmes worth thousands of crores  were initiated. These included a  Rs5,081 crore mega port facility development programme under the National Port  Development Programme, a Rs7,800 cr port-based multi-product and services Special Economic Zone, Rs1,200 crore deep draft satellite port at Tuna, and deepening of the Sogal navigational channel serving as the port's entrance channel for free navigation of post-Panamax (ships that can cross panama channel) vessels and creation of the country's first off-shore oil terminal in Jamnagar district," Vaghela said. 

Stating that the port was not materially affected by global recession, Vaghela said that it handled an all-time record of more than 72 million tonnes of cargo, the highest among all the major ports of the country. "We continue to be the cheapest port in handling of all types of cargo. We top in productivity in the country with cost-effectivness, transparency and customer focus being our other hallmarks," he said.

He said while their main port at Kandla handled mostly dry cargo, Vadinar solely handled imported crude oil for the country's refineries in the Gujarat and in Northern India. "We handled 35 million tonnes of crude, the highest handled by any major port in the financial year gone by," he said.