OREANDA-NEWS. Essar Bulk Terminal Limited, Hazira (“Hazira Terminal”), a subsidiary of Essar Ports Limited (“Essar Ports”), which is a part of Essar, has received an approval from Gujarat Maritime Board (GMB) to handle 15 million tonnes of merchant cargo over three years.

Based on this approval, the Hazira Terminal, in keeping with its design and capabilities, will be able to handle a range of cargo for merchant customers, including dry bulk, liquid bulk, containers and so on.

The approval was granted under GMB’s captive port policy where jetties built on captive licenses can handle third-party cargo up to a maximum of 50% of the total cargo handled. This approval stands to benefit the local industry who will now have access to a modern port facility. It will also increase the revenue to the government because of better utilizsation of port capacity. Hazira Terminal has a capacity to handle 30 million tonnes of cargo annually

Says Mr Rajiv Agarwal, Managing Director – Essar Ports Limited: “Hazira terminal has a strong industrial hinterland. Various coal traders and other industrial customers have entered into agreements with us to handle their cargo through Hazira Terminal to take advantage of our deep draft and high mechanization, which result in significant cost advantages to our customers. Our all-weather terminal also presents opportunity for these customers to utilize port services when nearby Magdalla port closes during monsoon season”

The permission for handling third-party cargo to Hazira terminal was earlier provided on a case-to-case basis. The current permission allows it to handle 15 million tonnes of commercial cargo over three years. Further approvals may be sought once the 5 million tonnes of cargo is handled. GMB will benefit from this arrangement since the wharfage charges it collects for the commercial cargo handled at Hazira Terminal is 1.5 times the wharfage received by GMB at other ports.

Hazira terminal has already started handling merchant coal cargo under this approval and handled 0.75 MMT until date.

About Essar Ports
Essar Ports is one of the largest port companies of India, with a current capacity of 140 MMTPA. The capacity is being expanded to 194 MMTPA over the next few years. Essar Ports has five operational port terminals at Hazira, Vadinar, Paradip, Salaya and Vizag Iron Ore and is estimated to handle approximately 90 MMT of cargo during FY17.

The Hazira port is an all-weather, deep-draft port with 30 MMTPA of dry bulk and break bulk cargo handling capacity. Vadinar is also an all-weather, deep-draft port with 58 MMTPA of liquid cargo handling capacity. The Paradip dry bulk terminal was commissioned in December 2012 and is an all-weather, deep-draft port with 16 MMTPA of dry bulk cargo handling capacity. The Vizag terminal is an operational berth taken over in May 2015 having capacity of 16 MMTPA. The Company’s newly commissioned dry bulk terminal at Salaya has increased its capacity by further 20 MMTPA.

Additionally, the Company is also expanding its Hazira port capacity by 20 MMTPA – taking Hazira capacity to 50 MMTPA. The Company is also undertaking capacity addition of iron ore berths at Visakhapatnam Port with a total capacity of 16 MMTPA. The Company also plans to develop a coal terminal at Paradip of 18 MMTPA capacity.