As a result, domestic exporters and importers are feeling the pinch as they have to fork out higher freight charges. Earlier, demurrage charges as a percentage of total freight charges was 3 to 4 per cent, while currently it is 5 to 7 per cent of the total freight charges.
Shipping companies have to pay demurrage charges for docking their ships for a longer-than-stipulated time by the port due to congestion.
Experts say that the immediate spurt in the pre-berthing detention was on account of other factors such as bad weather, breakdown of material handling equipment and labour issues that had further compounded the problem.
Sailesh Rao, partner, Ernst & Young, said: "Ports at the east coast of India have to face rough weather. During the last monsoon they were hit by cyclones, which had delayed the arrival and departure of vessels. This resulted in higher pre-berthing detention hours at ports. Further, frequent labour issues at ports like the Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust (JNPT), Cochin Port have also contributed to high detention hours."
For instance, the pre-berthing detention at the Paradip port on the east coast has increased by a whopping 2,445 per cent from 1.41 hours in 2006-07 to 35.88 hours in 2007-08. Similarly, the detention hours at Haldia Dock at the Kolkata Port Trust rose by 37.42 per cent from 25.68 hours to 32.29 hours.
JNPT, which frequently gets affected by labour strikes, has also witnessed an increase of 74 per cent in its pre-berthing detention hours during 2007-08 over the previous year.
Also Read
Experts also argue that the upgrade of infrastructure facilities at major ports is not able to keep pace with the increase in the cargo traffic, which is showing 15-20 per cent growth per annum.
Aravind Mahajan, executive director, KPMG, said: "Long process for the clearance of major expansion and modernisation of port infrastructure projects are putting pressure on the existing facilities that is leading to port congestion. Actually the projects which are."
G K Gupta, president, Federation of Indian Export Organisations (FIEO), said: "Because of the infrastructure bottlenecks ships waiting for extra time, therefore, incur demurrage which is ultimately passed on to the shipper. This adds on to the transaction costs of the exporter."
Interestingly, two of the 12 major ports in the country had managed to reduce their pre-berthing detention hours considerably. Kandla Port, which handled the highest amount of traffic of 64.89 million tonnes during 2007-08, has witnessed its pre-berthing detention hours reduce by 32 per cent from 38.64 hours to 26.16 hours during the same year.
Similarly, the pre-berthing detention at Tuticorin has also come down by 46.66 per cent to 3.84 hours.