But not all impacts are negative. For example, customers are being asked to process cargo electronically which is helping to \u201cdecongest\u201d human traffic in the port, among creating other efficiencies.<\/p>\n
Covid impact<\/strong><\/p>\n At the beginning of the pandemic, Kenya Ports Authority (KPA), which operates the Port of Mombasa, was forced to suspend all operations except core ones of loading and unloading of exports and imports. This was following two senior staff succumbing to Covid-19 related complications and several others being found to be in infected.<\/p>\n The Kenyan government, working with other East Africa Community (EAC) State partners, including Tanzania and Uganda, also promulgated new regulations for truckers picking and dropping cargo at Mombasa so as to enhance safety of drivers and reduce chances of spreading the Covid-19 infections across the East African region.<\/p>\n For example, entry of truckers to the Port of Mombasa was banned for drivers who have not been tested and issued with Covid-19 free certificate within 48 hours of entry.<\/p>\n Reduced operations, increased efficiency<\/strong><\/p>\n Currently, the port handles annual container traffic of more than 1.4 million teu with an estimated total of 31.479 million tonnes of cargo.<\/p>\n It is the main gateway for exports and imports for the rest of East Africa with transit cargo going to Uganda (82%), South Sudan (7.6%), Democratic Republic of Congo (4.9%), Tanzania (2.6%), Rwanda (2.4%) and Burundi (0.2%).<\/p>\n Despite reduced operations, the port management has launched measures such as scheduled fumigation of key equipment, operation areas, offices and workshops to keep cargo passing through the port.<\/p>\n And it has streamlined its operations in the process becoming more efficient and greener in a number of ways.<\/p>\n \u201cWe have enabled our online cargo documentation processes to facilitate our customers to clear cargo electronically and decongest human traffic within the port,\u201d says Mr Rashid Salim, acting managing director KPA.<\/p>\n In addition, ships docking at the Port of Mombasa are now required \u201cto declare their crew health status and the last ten ports of call.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThose that came from countries infected by coronavirus are subjected to rigorous inspection and crews are not allowed to get off the vessel,\u201d Salim added.<\/p>\n Impacts going forward<\/strong><\/p>\n Mr Salim says KPA will insist on strict compliance with the international treaty for garbage control at sea, referred to also as MARPOL 73\/78 Annex V for all vessels especially those from high rates of Covid-19.<\/p>\n \u201cGarbage from vessels arriving from confirmed Covid-19 countries will not be allowed to be discharged at any Kenyan port,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n At the moment the Port of Mombasa does not have adequate facilities to handle waste from ships although a comprehensive waste management plan for the port is in the works.<\/p>\n The number of vessels calling at the Port of Mombasa has been increasing with KPA reporting 1,696 vessels in 2018\/2019 up from the previous 1,661 vessels. Although this translates into more marine revenue it also exerts pressure on KPA to effectively address likely surge of ship waste.<\/p>\n The suspension of operations at the port except for the loading and unloading of imports and exports because of Covid-19 could impact delivery levels of the Green Port Policy activities such as the Mombasa Resilient Infrastructure Programme that includes environmental interventions such as those in the water sector.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The unforeseen outbreak of the deadly Covid-19 has impacted many port operations across Africa with East Africa\u2019s biggest Port of Mombasa being described as a \u2018hotspot\u2019 for transmission of the virus.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":1044,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[52,72],"tags":[],"sponsor":[],"class_list":["post-1043","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-africa","category-africa-greenport"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/greenport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1043","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/greenport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/greenport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/greenport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/greenport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1043"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/greenport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1043\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1045,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/greenport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1043\/revisions\/1045"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/greenport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1044"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/greenport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1043"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/greenport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1043"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/greenport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1043"},{"taxonomy":"sponsor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portstrategy.com\/greenport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/sponsor?post=1043"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}