Chittagong Port faces severe container congestion as Bangladesh goes into lockdown

Chittagong Port in Bangladesh (Photo: Maritime Gateway)

As of July 26, there were 43,574 TEUs - out of a total capacity of 49,018TEUs - lying at the container yards at the port of Chittagong, while on July 25, 1,901TEUs had been delivered from the yards compared to the number of containers is normally 4,000 TEUs. The lowest delivery was recorded on July 21, when importers received only 128 TEUs.

Importers said factories and warehouses are now closed due to the blockade and all employees are on leave, so no one is picking up containers from container yards at the port.

Faced with that situation, on July 25, Bangladesh Customs approved the transfer of imported containers to 19 privately owned inland container depots (ICDs) to reduce the number of containers located at the port.

Normally, only 38 types of imported cargo containers are moved to ICDs and delivered there, but due to the new approval, until August 31, all types of imported cargo containers will be moved there.

Secretary of the Chittagong Port Authority, Omar Faruk, said that the failure of importers to respond to calls from the port authorities to come and receive containers had created the crisis, saying the transfer of all types of containers goods imported to ICDs from July 26.

19 ICDs currently have a storage capacity of 78,700 TEU, while on Sunday there was only 53,845 TEU. As a result, they will be able to store an additional 15,000 containers, with the remaining areas used for shipping containers.

Ruhul Amin Sikder, secretary of Bangladesh Inland Container Depots Association (BICDA), added that 11,838TEU of export goods are lying in domestic container yards for a long time. Normally, there are only about 6,000 such containers at the yards.

Meanwhile, the port authority also threatened to penalize importers who fail to pick up their cargo containers within four days free of charge from the day the container is unloaded at the port.

At the port of Chittagong, importers do not pay for the container storage space for the first 4 days from the day the container is unloaded from the vessel. Rent fee is collected from Thursday onwards.

According to the Working Regulations of the Port of Chittagong, the government can impose penal rent on overstaying containers located at the port that are overdue after a certain period of time.

Source: Phaata.com (According to ContainerNews)

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