Crisis at the Colombo Port
The Colombo port is facing a critical period of congestion, traffic and low worker turnout due to the COVID-19 outbreak causing delays for exporters while vessels bypass Colombo.
“If we continue to have delays and miss connections then the next few weeks will be critical,” Ceylon Association of Ships’ Agents (CASA) Chairman Iqram Cuttilan said on Thursday.
He noted that already about seven vessels had bypassed the Colombo port due to the delays and traffic build up between the terminals, and if it should continue to next week then it will pose a challenge.
This will clearly be a concern for Colombo’s status as a transshipment hub, and should congestion and delays continue it could result in shipping lines re-routing their vessels to Dubai and Singapore.
The Colombo port handles only about 18 per cent of domestic traffic while the rest is mainly transshipment volumes with 70 per cent meant for India.
However, another pressing concern at the Colombo port is the build-up of boxes at the terminals since the vessels that discharge are located at one terminal and the feeder or vessel that needs to pick up these boxes to be sent to mostly Indian ports is sitting in another terminal.
This has resulted in a build-up of inter terminal traffic and currently the Colombo International Container Terminal (CICT) terminal is congested since the transshipment containers are discharged and the boxes are stuck in transmission as a result there is a pile up. Movements between the terminals are creating a problem since the yards are congested, he noted.
Mr. Cuttilan said they had a discussion on Thursday morning with the Sri Lanka Ports Authority (SLPA) and arrived at a decision to ensure that terminals will facilitate both the transshipment container vessels and feeders at the same terminal to ease operations.
Currently due to low worker capacity at the Jaya Container Terminal (JCT) the terminal is “struggling” and last week there had been a drop of workers by about 30 per cent that has this week improved to about 10 per cent, he noted.
The South Asia Gateway Terminal (SAGT) that was faced with strike action by workers last week resulted in delays but this has now returned to normal. CICT is operating at full capacity as well, Mr. Cuttilan said.
There have been delays of about one or two days also due to the low worker turnout with workers getting tested positive for COVID-19 and the fact that the SLPA has been unable to bring them down from the Gampaha district due to the restrictions against crossing borders, he said.
The CASA Chairman also explained that people are facing the threat of getting infected and whatever precautions they take it is not easy to keep it out and they face a challenge in this regard as well.
Another area of concern is that the customs and banks are working on limited hours and with a minimal staff and that creates issues due to documentation delays.