KARACHI, March 17: The three container terminals at the country's (Karachi and Qasim) ports are going to face an acute congestion within next two to three years if there is no timely expansion in existing facilities or no new terminals are developed to meet the 18 per cent annual growth in the traffic of containerised cargo.

The booming Asian economies are witnessing higher traffic of containerised cargo, with an annual growth of 14 per cent which stands highest in the world. However, Pakistan, which has been witnessing a high GDP growth for the last five years, is recording box tariff growth at 18 per cent.Ports and shipping experts believe that such a high growth in container traffic warrants early correction and necessary measures to avoid long delays in turn-around period of ships reporting at country's container terminals.

In the past when country's ports faced congestion, shipping companies imposed Pakistan Port Surcharge (PPS) which added to the cost of country's external trade.

However, under the present competitive world market, our exports and imports would not be able to bear any sort of burden because this would ultimately make our products costlier and uncompetitive against the regional countries.

Consequently, there is an urgent need to meet the future challenges by taking necessary measures, i.e. increasing contai-ner handling facilities and improving the existing ones.

The issue could only be handled by adopting a two-pronged strategy of improving the existing port facilities and secondly by developing new and ultra-modern container terminals, which can meet the long-term needs of country's ever-increasing external trade which has increased from around $20 billion five years back to the expected value of over $40 to $45 billion for the current fiscal.

The rapid growth in external trade (imports and exports) owing to brisk economic activity could well be gauged from the fact that during the first eight months of the current fiscal, imports stood around $20 billion and exports about $11 billion.

The country's container traffic has been recording an annual growth of around 18 per cent for the last five years. The two container terminals (KICT & PICT) at the Karachi Port handled around 0.652 million boxes in 2000-01, and recorded a traffic of over 1.144 million boxes last year.

Similarly, the Qasim terminal at Port Qasim handled around 0.158m containers in the year 2000-01, and witnessed a traffic of 0.544 million TEUs in 2005-06.

According to experts, growth of container traffic at Karachi Port for next three (2009-10) years has been estimated around 1.8 million TEUs and at Qasim International Container Terminal (QICT) it will go up to 0.856 million.

However, the container terminals at KPT and PQA would not be able to handle these quantities as they exceed their capacity at 1.6 million TEUs and 0.8 million TEUs, respectively. This means that within next three years, traffic flow of around 0.2 million boxes would be more than the handling capacity of country’s three container terminals.

If the current growth rate of 18 per cent in container tariff continues even beyond 2009-10, experts believe this would mean that by 2014-15 total movement of boxes would be at around 4.278 million and by 1019-20 the same would be around 6.286 million boxes. Out of these, the KPT’s share, which normally stands over 65 per cent of total cargo tariff (bulk or boxes), would stand at 2.899 million boxes by 1014-15 and 4.260 million TEUs by 2019-20.

Similarly, the Qasim terminal would also be facing a heavy traffic of around 1.379 million by 2014-15 and 2.026 million TEUs by 2019-20. However, the PQA is working on the second container terminal which is expected to become operational in the next two to three years. This may provide some relief to the growing container traffic for some short period.

Despite the fact that Karachi Port presently has two container terminals, it is still at a disadvantageous position as compared with Port Qasim owing to draft restriction which is 10.5 metres as against 11 to 11.5 metres drafts at Port Qasim. As a result of this, smaller container vessels call at the Karachi Port as compared with the Port Qasim.

Beside this, the Karachi Port also has a host of other limitations which do not allow it to deepen the draft of existing berths for accommodating large size container vessels. The foremost problem is the narrow and restricted space between East and West wharves which is too little to allow large vessels to have sufficient turn circle when sailing out of the harbour.

Though the Karachi Port plans to deepen most of its berths in the coming years, again this will not allow super post Panamax vessels carrying containers to moor at these berths. Another problem, which does not allow the Karachi Port authorities to expand existing berths is the limited back-up area of these terminals, which is necessary for storage and rapid movement of containers out of the port.

According to experts, the existing width of the channel running between East and West wharves is 183 metres which is only sufficient to allow one-way movement of small vessels. Against this, container vessels, having 14.5- metre draft are normally 47-metre wide and 340-metre long require 254-metre width (one-way) to take a turn circle for sailing out of the harbour. However, a 14.5-metre draft is workable for bulk carriers which are not that much wide and could take turn circle in a narrower width of even 183 metres.

Nevertheless, if the Karachi Port has to avoid future congestion and also meet rapidly growing economic growth resulting in higher container traffic, it will have to hasten its programme of developing an ultra-modern project of Pakistan Deep Water Container Port (PDWCP), comprising 10 berths at Keamari Groyne area.

This mega project would be first on the world map of ports to have 18 metres draft which could accommodate super post Panamax container vessels which could carry up to 14,000 TEUs having 24 rows in width and only super post Panamax gantry cranes could operate for loading and unloading of boxes from these mother ships.

The PDWCP could become hub port of the region to cater to the rapidly growing Asian economies, besides meeting the hinterland movement of cargo, including north-west Indian states.

The KPT officials told Dawn that foreign consultants to the PDWCP – Royal Haskoning and Scott Wilson – have already prepared a feasibility report of the project, including hydraulic module, navigational operations have been made to ensure proper configuration. Location and direction of protection works and berths have been carried out. However, what is needed at this stage is quick execution of the project so that the planned four berths under phase I could start operating within next three to four years.

The deep container terminal will help the business community of the country to meet economies of scale and under present tough competition, freight charges have assumed a very critical role in global trade competitiveness and larger the vessels, the lesser the freight cost.

Experts believe that the Gwadar Port will take some time to directly contribute towards the national economy because fairly huge infrastructure development was yet needed to make it useful for local business community.

There is no direct road or rail links from Gwadar port to the upcountry. The M-8 road, which will directly link the port to other parts of the country, is nowhere in government plans of execution. However, the rail-link is most vital for quick and economic movement of cargo from the port and this too is not seen to be executed in the near future.