KARACHI, July 28: The Karachi Port Trust earned all time record income of Rs9.270 billion during the fiscal year 2003-04, showing an increase of 10 per cent over the preceding year's income of Rs8.423 billion, officials said on Wednesday.

The officials said the KPT had also surpassed its budgeted income of Rs8.462 billion by Rs708 million or 9.5 per cent. The KPT after meeting its expenditure during the fiscal year 2003-04 was left with a huge surplus of Rs4.258 billion that stood higher by 3.4 per cent against the previous year's surplus of Rs4.116 billion.

All these achievements were made at a time when the port lowered its tariff of 'wet charges' by more than 15 per cent during the second half of 2003-04, the officials said.

Almost all the sources of the KPT income registered a sizable growth except income from ship movement, services and property management that recorded a fall but was absorbed by the prudent management presently working with modern tools and automation.

Income earned through ship movement during 2003-04 declined to Rs1.988 billion as against Rs2.363 billion realized a year ago. Since the income from ship movement was directly linked with wet charges, therefore, it was natural to record a fall because these charges were slashed by up to 15 per cent.

After the 9/11 incident, the local currency became stronger against the US dollar resulting in a fall in income from ship movement which is normally charged by the KPT in US dollar.

Another major factor for decline in income from ship movement was because of lesser number of vessels arriving at the port. In the past, the port used to handle small size vessels as there was no deeper draught.

However, the KPT has now started to handle vessels with deep draught as the approach channel and berths have been made to handle such vessels. Consequently, the vessels with deeper draught and larger cargo haulage capacity caused a fall in number of vessels reporting at the Karachi Port.

During the outgoing fiscal year, total cargo (dry and liquid bulk) handled by the port stood at 27.8 million tons or seven per cent more than the previous year when it handled 25.9 million tons. The number of containers handled during the period under review rose to 824,753 from 729,957 a year ago, showing an increase of 94,796 TEUs or 13 per cent.

Income from cargo handling increased to Rs2.487 billion as against Rs1.924 billion the last year. Similarly, income from cargo storage improved to Rs852 million from Rs521 million of the previous year.