Dampened spirits
Chittagong’ s deep water port plan falters as its neighbours get the jump on construction, as Wing Goh-Wah finds out
Political infighting, high surcharges, strikes, and critical reports from the International Maritime Bureau on piracy have all given Chittagong a hard time of it in the past 12 months.
Last September, the long awaited New Mooring Container Terminal (NCT) opened its first berth with three more coming onstream this year. As in Pakistan’s Gwadar, the terminal was constructed by Beijing headquartered China Harbour Engineering Group. In the past year riverine routes have been dredged to allow barges to travel from Kunming, the capital of China’s landlocked southwestern province of Yunnan, all the way to Bangladesh.
Eager to modernise ancient systems, the Chittagong Customs Authority moved this March to introduce a ‘green channel’ in an effort to reduce container congestion as well as the turnaround time of vessels.
The new channel will allow customers to divert their containers directly to private inland container depots as they are offloaded from the vessels without the time consuming customs procedures currently in place. Furthermore, this August the keenly anticipated ‘Window Berthing’ system was introduced at the seaport.
Despite these improvements the country remains firmly a non-preferred destination for almost all carriers. With big deepwater port plans taking place in India, Sri Lanka and Myanmar, the country decided at the end of July not to build a new large port. One had been earmarked on the Bay of Bengal.
“We have decided not to go ahead with the deep seaport plan at this stage, as the efficiency of Chittagong port has increased remarkably over the past six months,” said MA Matin, shipping minister in the interim government. Officials said delays in a feasibility plan for the new $720m port also contributed to its cancellation.
The Chittagong Port Authority (CPA) drew up plans for the new port off the coast of Kutubdia, 65 km (40 miles) south of Chittagong port.
Officials said the new port would have provided a regional hub for Nepal, Bhutan, southern China, Myanmar and northeastern India, raised annual container handling capacity to 3m teu and boosted bulk cargo handling capacity to 100m tonnes. That cargo will now go elsewhere, perhaps even to the sleepy backwater dictatorship of Myanmar.
Myanmar announced this August it is conducting a feasibility study to build a deep-sea port in the southern coastal town of Dawei in Tanintharyi division to facilitate maritime trade with neighbouring countries.
The port project was first proposed by India at a foreign ministerial meeting of the seven-member Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) held in Phuket, Thailand in February 2004.
On completion of the project, ships from the Middle East, Africa and Europe could avoid the Malacca Strait for access to China, Thailand, Vietnam and Laos. As such the port concept is an alternative to the much talked about, wildly expensive Kra Canal concept cutting through southern Thailand.
Government sources suggested ships from the region could save about 1,250 nautical miles (2,316 nautical km) and four days’ time compared with transiting through Singapore.
Meanwhile, Myanmar is also conducting a survey to build another deep-sea port on Maday Island in Kyaukphyu, western coastal Rakhine state, to serve as a transit trade centre for goods destined to port cities of Chittagong, Yangon and Calcutta.
Kyaukphyu also stands at a point on a proposed land route connecting southwestern China’s Kunming in Yunnan province with Myanmar’s Sittwe through Mandalay. The overall road link between Myanmar and China under study is outlined as Kunming-Mandalay- Kyaukphyu-Sittwe.
The Indian Government confirmed at the end of last year that it will invest Rs4.5bn ($100m) to rebuild Myanmar’s Sittwe Port in order to connect North East India with Mizoram through the Kaladyn River. “New Delhi wants to connect northeast India with the ASEAN (Association of South East Asian Nations) countries without Bangladesh,” Indian Minister of State for Commerce Jairam Ramesh told local newspapers. The project is slated for completion within three years. Bilateral trade between Myanmar and India rose by 24% to approximately $557m for the 2005-06 fiscal year ended March.