Latest Releases

March 18, 2002

'25'

RAJYA SABHA

EFFICIENCY AND REVENUE OF MAJOR PORTS IN TAMIL NADU

To increase efficiency and capacity of major ports and consequential their revenue, the following major steps have been taken from time to time in relation to all major ports of the country including the major ports situated in the state of Tamil Nadu :-

Construction and equipping of new berths/terminals,
Replacement of existing equipment with the state-of-art equipment on existing berths,
Labour training and improvement in management practices for achieving higher efficiency/output,
Private sector involvement in the development and operation of port facilities to bring out additional investment and modern techniques for greater efficiency,
Computerisation of port working and partial induction of Electronic Data Interchange and
Setting up of Vessel Traffic Management System inputs have improved safety of the ships.

Main efforts made recently to increase efficiency and revenue of the major ports situated in the state of Tamil Nadu are given below port-wise :-

Name of the Port	Efforts
Chennai	Leasing out of existing container terminal to a private company. Modernisation/deepening of berths located in the Inner Harbour and increasing the draft to 11 meters.
Tuticorin	Leasing out of Berth No.7 for operating container terminal by a private company. Capital dredging of the shipping channel to increase the depth by about 2 meters to service the larger ships. The Port has also started night navigation of deep draught vessels.
Ennore	Port has been commissioned in June, 2001. Two berths constructed for receiving coal have been made fully operational through mechanized system of unloading to facilitate quicker discharge of thermal coal imported by Tamil Nadu Electricity Board.

This information was given in the Rajya Sabha today by Shri Shripad Y. Naik, Minister of State for Shipping in a written reply to a question by Prof. M. Sankaralingam.