Visakhapatnam Port registers a minor drop in cargo handling

Though the port registered some good growth in handling of steam coal, thermal coal and containers, there has been a drop in its core products such as crude oil, iron ore and coking coal

Battling COVID-19 pandemic and a sluggish market, Visakhapatnam Port Authority recorded a cargo handling turnover of 69.03 million tonnes for the financial year ending 2021-22. This was about 1% lower than the corresponding previous year, when the port handled 69.84 million tonnes of cargo.

Though the port registered some good growth in handling of steam coal, thermal coal and containers, there has been a drop in its core products such as crude oil, iron ore and coking coal.

According to the Chairman of VPA, K. Rama Mohana Rao, the drop in the iron ore from 188.61 lakh tonnes to 145.59, was mainly due to the fall in prices in the international market and the drop in coking coal from 54.23 lakh tonnes to 44.28 lakh tonnes is due the Union government asking the coal users to buy domestic coal under the Atma Nirbhar Bharat initiative, to reduce the outflow of foreign exchange. In crude oil handling, there is a drop of about 11%, over the previous year.

On the brighter side, there has been a substantial increase in the handling of steam coal and it has gone up from 50.75 lakh tonnes to 70.05 lakh tonnes. Thermal coal has gone up from 6.95 lakh tonnes to 25.96 lakh tonnes and containers have gone up from 81.78 lakh tonnes to 85.83 lakh tonnes.

Though the port has slipped from third position to fourth in the major ports ranking, efforts are on to modernise it and we expect to lodge a good growth from next year and take the capacity to over 77 million tonnes in the next couple of years, said Mr. Rama Mohana Rao.

Keeping in view of the change in cargo pattern and policies such as Atma Nirbhar Bharat, the port has decided to modify its cargo profile. We are now focussing on handling of food grains and preliminary talks are on with investors to build storage facilities with an investment of about ₹200-300 crore.

“We have a few existing godowns that are being refurbished and we will take food grains in a big way. This apart, our crude oil handling will go up, as HPCL has already expanded its capacity from eight million tonnes to 15 million tonnes,” he said.