Mumbai, May 26 (IANS). Union port, vessel transport and waterways Minister Sarbananda Sonowal said on Monday that the container handling capacity of Jawaharlal Nehru Port has increased to 10 million. This is the first time a port in the country has gained this ability.
On the 36th Foundation Day of Jawaharlal Nehru Port Authority (JNPA), the Union Minister said that this port handles 40 percent of the total container handling of the country.
Sonowal further said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visionary leadership has encouraged the ministry to perform well in all verticals. For this reason, the ministry is doing well in every field today.
Additionally, the Union Minister thanked the private players associated with the port and the people of Maharashtra on this achievement of JNPA.
He further said that the round time of the ports of the country is decreasing and cargo handling capacity is increasing. With this, the country is ready to become the world’s leading maritime nation in the next 25 years.
According to the Union Minister, the government is taking several steps to move forward in the Maritime sector and ship building, ship repair and ship recycling are being promoted.
According to Sonowal, the country has done a lot of work in the inland waterways in the last decade and cargo handling from inland waterways has now increased to 145 million tonnes, which was 18 million tonnes in 2014.
Earlier, the government had said that the major ports of the country have increased the cargo handling capacity in FY 2025 to a record 855 million tonnes, which shows an increase of 4.3 percent in FY 2024 as compared to the same figure of 819 million tonnes.
The Ministry of port, vessel transport and waterways said that the increase in traffic was due to high container throwput, fertilizer cargo handling, POL (petroleum, oil and lubricants) and handling of diverse items, including 10 percent, 13 percent, 3 percent and 31 percent respectively.
-IANS
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