Salient Sailing

C. N. Patel
Advisor
Gujarat Maritime Board

Year 2011-12: A Year That Was!! It’s a human tendency to mull over the time gone by. We are just at the beginning of a new financial year and for any business, industry or an organization, a new financial year brings about new hopes, new planning, new targets and newer methodologies. But before planning and setting up targets for the New Year, wouldn’t it be wise to look at what happened in the year that has just gone by. Isn’t is worthwhile to have a look at the achievements of the organization, to see what has worked towards leading for a betterment of the organization and finding answers like would there have been better ways of doing things?

Capacity Creation and Traffic Handled:

Year 2011-12 brought in new hopes, new achievements and added new feathers to the list of feats of Gujarat Maritime Board. Being the regulator, facilitator and administrator for Non-major ports of Gujarat, Gujarat Maritime Board took steps to create an atmosphere of development for the stakeholders of the Maritime sector. We started off with the capacity creation of 284 MMTPA with the feat of achieving traffic of 231 MT at Gujarat’s non-major ports. For any coastal state whose economy is banking on the ports sector, adding more and more capacity to its coastline is the ultimate target. We feel a great proud in announcing that during the year 2011-12, we have added a capacity of 39 MMT to our coastline which is 14% addition to the previous year’s amount of capacity. At the beginning of this new financial year, we sit at a staggering capacity of 323 MMTPA. The projects that have contributed towards achieving this capacity include the following:

• Development of Coal Terminal for Ultra Mega Power Plant at Mundra adding the capacity of 15 MMTPA.
• Operation of SBM and Crude oil terminal at Mundra with a capacity of 9 MMTPA
• Phase II Commercial operations commenced at the Solid Cargo Port Terminal at Dahej adding a capacity of 8 MMTPA
• Twin SPM facilities for export of crude from Bhogat to New Manglore port adding a capacity of 7 MMTPA

With the increase in the traffic handling capacity, the traffic handled at Gujarat's ports also shot up to 259 MT from last year's 231 MT making a 12.12% increase in the traffic handled.

Not only were the capacities added during the year 2011-12 by completion of various projects, various permissions of construction were granted to developers along the coastline of Gujarat that would add the capacity to the coastline in the upcoming years.

RO-RO Ferry between Dahej and Ghogha:

A very important achievement that would reiterate the brand name of Gujarat at the pinnacle of Maritime excellence is the project of running a Ro-Ro ferry service between Dahej and Ghogha. The project is one of the dream projects of Hon’ble Chief Minister of Gujarat, Shri Narendrabhai Modi. The project had its auspicious beginning in January this year with Hon’ble Chief Minister laying the Foundation Stone for commencement of the project at Ghogha.

Upgrading Infrastructure at Ports:

Not only have we granted permissions to private developers for marine projects, steps have also been taken to ensure that infrastructure at GMB owned ports get upgraded on time. Construction work of a jetty at Porbandar which is being built for the Indian Navy was in full force that would make this project totally operational by September 2012. Similarly, the work of development of Block wharf at Okha which commenced in previous year also went ahead in full swing with 54 m of the wharf being completed in the year 2011-12.

To augment the storage capacity at Navlakhi, work for development of coal stacking yards was initiated in the year 2011-12. On completion of these works by the mid of financial year 2012-13, the storage capacity at Navlakhi shall get augmented to a staggering 70,000 MT.

As a part of revival plans of the historical Bhavnagar port, the 147 m long concrete jetty was renovated along with repairing of the historical Bhavnagar lockgate. This renovation of the Lockgate had a magical effect on the traffic being handled at Bhavnagar which stands at 7.89 lac tons for the year 2011-12. A feat achieved after many long years.

Seamless port connectivity has been given due importance by Gujarat Maritime Board year on year and steps have been taken to improve the connectivity to ports. During the year 2011-12, to ease the movement of vehicles at Bedi port, Gujarat Maritime Board constructed a 5.42 km by-pass road connecting link road to State Highway near Samarpan Junciton with a cost of Rs. 14.54 crore.

Another very important project that is an important step towards providing last mile rail connectivity to the ports of Gujarat is commissioning of Dahej Bharuch Rail Project which a project of conversion of 67.86 km long Bharuch-Samni-Dahej Narrow Gauge (NG) rail line to Broad Gauge (BG) rail line. The trial run by Diesel Engine was carried out on December 1, 2011.

Other Achievements:

Other feats in the name of Gujarat Maritime Board include getting ISO 9001/2008 certification by IRQS to Alang Training Institute. Realizing the importance of Maritime education and lack of it in Gujarat, GMB also formed ‘GMB Education Trust’ that would help develop a Polytechnic College at Rajula. Being the conservator of the coastline and realizing the importance of security in today’s times, GMB had already implemented VTMS (Vessel Traffic Monitoring System) in Gulf of Khambhat. Continuing the trail, VTMS for Gulf of Kutch to be implemented by Directorate General of Lighthouse and Lightships, Government of India with the aid from GMB and Kandla Port Trust was inaugurated in February 2012. Another important achievement of Gujarat Maritime Board’s efforts in making a difference to the Maritime sector was receiving a confirmation from P&I Club stating that the vessels registered with IG of P & I Club should have Insurance coverage for Wreck Removal and Oil Pollution.

Alang, the biggest ship recycling yard of Asia, has recycled a total of 415 ships in the year 2011-12 – the highest number recycled till date whilst also generating 3.86 MMT of LDT. Comparing it with last year, this year showed a surge of 16.2% in the number of ships recycled and an increase of 36.9% for the LDT generated.

Gujarat Maritime Board yet again added an achievement to its lists of being ‘Firsts’ by publishing its own Indian Vessels Act and got it notified from Ministry of Shipping.

And last but not the least, was the initiative of starting GMB e-Musing that brought together the stakeholders of maritime sector for sharing their views and creating a knowledge sharing platform which has successfully completed one full year with four timely editions to its credit.

Summing it up:

Year by Year, Gujarat Maritime Board has been taking initiatives to take the maritime sector of the state at the pinnacles of excellence. Efforts to increase the rate of development, efforts to ease the difficulties of the stakeholders, efforts to achieve higher targets and last but not the least efforts to keep the flame of maritime excellence alive have been undertaken in the year 2011-12. With the passion and zeal to keep the status of Gujarat as the most promising state for maritime development, we can proudly say that the year 2011-12 kept its promises. What a year that was!!