Inland Waterways Authority of India (IWAI) is planning to set up five cargo handling terminals with private equity investors on national waterways-1 to facilitate trade with Bangladesh.IWAI has chosen five locations, between Haldia and Kolaghat on the river Rupnarayan in West Bengal for jetties to handle inland water vessels.IFCI, which is working as a consultant for bid process management for IWAI, has floated tenders for the joint venture partners to develop facilities at Bandel, Shalimar and Budge Budge on the river Hoogly apart from Haldia and Kolaghat.IWAI has proposed to acquire the land for developing jetties as well as provide some of the handling equipment in case to case basis. IWAI authority is hoping to award the contract to private investors by this financial year. It has earmarked Rs 15 crore for this purpose only during this fiscal.The jetties are being built with the primary aim of facilitating trade with Bangladesh. "We are hoping that there would be substantial demand for carrying fly ash, gypsum, cement, steel to Bangladesh through inland waterways mode," an IWAI official said.IWAI is in the process of acquiring container vessels which can ply in depth of 1.5 metre. By this process, exporters can take containers to Narayangunge near Dhaka once the terminal comes up there. At present, about 30-35,000 tonne of fly ash is being exported to Bangladesh every month through this mode. An IWAI study indicates this could be doubled if necessary infrastructure is built. Similarly, 10,000 tonne of gypsum can be exported now and this could go up to 40,000 tonne a month.Exporters are expected to benefit from low user charges for IWT vessels at jetties managed by IWAI compared to charges at major ports like Kolkata. Indian businessmen are facing competition in these commodities from Indonesia and Myanmer.The jetty at Bandel, Budge Budge and Kolaghat will mainly deal in fly ash generated from thermal power plants there. The jetty at Shalimar will focus on cement and steel. The facility at Haldia will be a more sophisticated one with conveyer belt and container crane. This will also cater to the virtual jetty built by Kolkata Port Trust at Saugor Island.
