Pipavav Port starts wheat shipmen

The first consignment of wheat for the year 2012 on behalf of the Government of India (GoI) was exported from Port of Pipavav on Sept. 20. The vessel MV Spar Canis sailed from the port with a total of 36,750.082 MT on board. The cargo is being exported by the GoI to Pt. Indofood Sukses in Jakarta, Indonesia.

Starting September, 2012, Port Pipavav has undertaken the handling of a new bulk cargo commodity – wheat. The port has tied up with the Food Corporation of India (FCI) to handle part of its wheat exports. The cargo was stored at Central Warehousing Corporation warehouses. The channelizing agent on behalf of FCI was MMTC and the trading partner was Louis Dreyfus.

Despite heavy rains at the port, the operations team achieved a much higher rate of loading than committed and reduced the turnaround time for the vessel by 26 hours.

“This is an important milestone for us. We were keen to deliver high levels of customer satisfaction to FCI, MMTC and Louis Deryfus,” said Capt. Dinesh Lokapure, Head of Bulk Business at APM Terminals Pipavav. “Handling wheat cargo calls for a number of special arrangements and extra effort to maintain professional and efficient movement and I am glad that my team achieved excellent results.”

Mr. Raman from Louis Drefyus said: “The performance has been above our expectations. We are definitely looking at Port Pipavav as one of the gateway ports for our bulk export shipments.”
It may be mentioned here that Port Pipavav handles coal, fertilizers, iron ore, scrap and other bulk commodities. New storage space and equipment have been added to the port’s facilities to handle wheat henceforth.

The port is expanding its infrastructure facilities and in the forthcoming years, the following projects will be completed:

    A new container berth of 348 m to provide contiguous berth of 735m – this will enable the port to simultaneously handle two post-panamax vessels
    Dredging in berth pockets
    3 new Post-Panamax cranes, 10 new rubber tyred gantry cranes
    Yard capacity for a total of 1.5 million TEUs
    Internal roads
    New container berth will enable the port to dedicate the existing multi-purpose berth exclusively for bulk cargo services
    Additional berth extension by 110 m to provide a contiguous berth of 800m
    Dredging
    New Gottwald crane
    Dedicated conveyor system for coal

The proposed expansion activities for bulk cargo will be undertaken based on customer requirements by entering into commercial arrangements with the customers.

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