Monday, 19 November 2012

Exempt Vizhinjam port from Cabotage Law

Kerala Minister for Ports K. Babu has said that the draft report of the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) study for the Vizhinjam international seaport project will be published and submitted for public hearing by December.  He said fresh bids would be invited for the operation of the Vizhinjam international seaport only after the project secured environmental clearance.

“The State Government has also appealed to the Centre seeking exemption from the Cabotage Law for the Vizhinjam seaport. We hope to get better bids, once the project secures environmental clearance and gets exempted from the Cabotage law,” he said and added that two or three tourist resorts could not be considered more important for Kerala than the ambitious Vizhinjam project. The Minister said the Vizhinjam project would pursue the landlord model under which the Government would invest in creating the basic port infrastructure, leaving the superstructure and installation of equipment to a private operator.

“90% of the land required for back up area, truck terminal and road has been acquired and steps have been initiated to acquire 100 acres for a warehouse,” the Minister pointed out.



No comments:

Post a Comment