Businesses rue their fate as some 1170 TEUs of containers, mostly with apparel and jute exports, missed scheduled shipment for a cargo-transport strike.
A greater dimension of the external trade disruption appeared to a be dent in the country's repute as a trading partner of international buyers owing to failure in maintaining time, sources in business circles said.
The aforesaid load of containers, laden with readymade garment and jute products, have been left out at the port of Chittagong due to the unwarranted delay caused by the transport strike against 'extra charges' in the off-docks in Chittagong this week.
A total of 15 feeder vessels left the port without taking the cargoes stuffed in those containers bound for transhipment ports of Singapore, Port Kelang and Colombo en-route to destinations in the USA, Europe and Australia via transportation by mother vessels from the transhipment ports.
Sources in businesses in Chittagong said the extent of image crisis caused to the Chittagong Port for the failure to catch the scheduled feeder vessels and to the connecting mother vessels is a matter of grave concern.
The damage caused to the country's export sector is not to be estimated in terms of money merely but it is a big question as to how the short-lived strike of the trucks, covered-vans, prime movers, trailers etc would cast a negative impact on export from Bangladesh, sources said.
Of the 1170 TEUs (twenty-foot equivalent unit) of export containers that were supposed to be shipped through the feeder vessels, 782 TEUs were of RMG (readymade garments), 150 jute products, 16 beverages and the rest 222 TEUs of containers with different non-traditional items.
Container handling in the Chittagong Port has been increasing at an average 15 per cent a year but the infrastructure and cargo-handling-equipment facilities fall far short of the demand, which remains a great concern for expansion of production, trade and business, as voiced by the entrepreneurs in different forums.
In 2008, Chittagong Port, the prime seaport of Bangladesh, handled only one million (10 lakh) TEUs of containers while it has crossed 2.5 million TEUs now with rapid annual growth in import and export. Over the last 10 years, the volume of cargo handling has multiplied two-and-a-half times.
A large volume of these cargoes is handled by the off-docks working as extended ports located in the port city of Chittagong. The off-docks, numbering 18, all surrounding the Port, load all export goods into containers and reach them to the feeder vessels for shipment across the globe.
The off-docks, also called ICDs (inland container depots), handle 37 major import items and thus play a very important role in augmenting country's trade and production to enrich the national economy.
Carried through the feeder vessels the export goods reach out to connecting mother vessels and shipped to other ports as desired by the buyers. So the businesses need to avail of the feeder vessels destined for the transhipment ports and then the connecting mother vessels to reach their products within the restricted schedule of the buyers, sources said.
If any shipment misses the feeder vessel, they are destined to miss the consignment reaching to the buyers by mother vessels waiting for feeder vessels in Singapore, Port Kelang of Malaysia or Colombo Port of Sri Lanka.
"If you fail to catch the feeder vessel and also the connecting mother vessel in transhipment port, your supply misses the schedule. So you will have to make another schedule to catch the feeder vessel and connecting mother vessel if the buyer is at all ready to consider the delay. Otherwise the order may be cancelled," said an RMG exporter, preferring not to be named.
He said it is "very unfortunate" that export goods worth millions of dollars are left without shipment in the off-docks following a row over only Tk 100 per truck or trailer. Such acts cost huge damage to the national export and economy.
The mother vessels generally don't wait for more than 24 hours as they carry goods for many ports, not one.
Last Saturday, the trucks, covered vans and trailers observed five-hour strike in protest against the latest move of the off-dock operators imposing Tk 50 as gate fee and Tk 50 as parking fee for each vehicle.
On Monday, they observed the strike from morning to evening and did not move any vehicle to and from the off-docks which handle 100 per cent export cargo in packing, loading in containers and reaching them to the port jetties where the feeder vessel anchor for taking the containers on board the vessels.
During this lockdown, some 15 feeder vessels left the port without taking the consignments of exports, said Ruhul Amin Sikder Biplab, secretary of Bangladesh Inland Container Depots Association, a forum of the off-dock owners of the country.
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