Move to re-model cargo evacuation system at ports to reduce congestion; e-marketplace for truck-trailers also part of the plan
Beleaguered container freight station (CFS) operators are set to get a fresh lease of life with the government working on an alternative cargo evacuation model to replace the direct port delivery (DPD) scheme. The new system will restore the role of these intermediaries in the supply chain backed by an e-marketplace for truck trailers, a top Shipping Ministry official said on Friday.
The DPD had triggered an “existential crisis” for CFS operators — some of them listed. The companies had invested thousands of crores over the years and employed thousands. But the DPD reduced their earnings from handling, storage and inspection charges.
“We are now trying to remodel our cargo evacuation system with the CFS as the fulcrum,” Shipping Secretary Gopal Krishna said at the annual day of the Container Freight Stations Association of India. “We are going back to the thinking that was prevalent in the late 1980s when this concept started that the CFS should take the burden of being the first repository of the boxes and thereafter cargo will move,” he stated.
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