Adani Hazira Port Pvt Ltd (HPPL), a unit of Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone Ltd (APSEZ), which runs the port at Hazira in Gujarat, said it will collect extra charges of Rs. 2,500 for a 20 ft container and Rs. 4000 for 40 and 45ft boxes from container freight station (CFS) operators when import loaded containers are taken to a CFS as nominated by the lines.
The new charge, which will come into force from 8 September, has been decried by firms running CFS’s in and around Hazira Port. Stating that it was an “arbitrary charge” being imposed by Hazira port, the Container Freight Stations Association of India (CFSAI), a lobby group for CFS operators, described the new levy as an “abuse of dominant position” by India’s biggest private port operator owned by tycoon Gautam Adani.
The CFSAI has sought Union government “intervention” on the matter in a post put up on the social media platform X (earlier known as Twitter).
Container ports/terminal operators typically levy terminal handling charges (THC) from the shipping lines for services associated with unloading of import containers from a ship and moving them into the port’s container yard. The shipping lines, in turn, recover the THC from the importers.
Shipping lines then nominate a CFS of their choice or the consignee’s choice where the import containers are taken for final delivery.
A CFS is an off dock facility licensed by the Customs Department to help decongest a port by shifting containerized cargo and carrying out customs related activities outside the port area.
CFS operators argue that Hazira port was not providing any “additional service” to the CFS operators to justify collecting the extra charge.
“The CFS operator does not have any contract with Hazira port. The port offloads a container from the vessel and shifts it to the container yard from where it gets picked up by vehicles sent by the CFS,” an official with one of the five CFS’s operating at Hazira port told ET Infra. One more CFS is expected to start operations soon at Hazira, taking the total CFS servicing the port to six.
“The extra charges will increase the transaction cost on clearing import containers at Hazira port by at least so percent. We cannot bear the extra costs and will have to pass it on to the importers, which, in turn, will make it expensive for the importers. The importers will then prefer to take the containers directly from the EXIM yard (that functions as a CFS) run by Adani, hurting the business of CFS operators,” he said.
Hazira port’s move to collect the extra charges follows the opening of a new CFS last week in the vicinity of the western coast port by a joint venture between A P Moller-Maersk (which runs Maersk Line, one of the world’s biggest) and a local firm. The new CFS spread over some is acres has the capacity to handle as much as 5000 containers a month.
“Maersk is expected to nominate its own CFS to move the boxes after unloading from the vessel arriving at Hazira port, potentially resulting in loss of business for the EXIM yard run by Adani, which is supported mainly by Maersk volumes. The new levy is said to be aimed at making it expensive for other CFS’s operating at Hazira,” a second CFS executive said, asking not to be named.
Hazira port handles some 25,000-30,000 twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) a month carried by lines such as CMA-CGM S.A, Ocean Network Express (ONE), Maersk Line, Mediterranean shipping Company S.A, Hapag Lloyd A G and other non-vessel owning common carriers (NVOCC’s).
Justifying its move, Adani Hazira Port Pvt Ltd said in a 25 August customer advisory it was committed to providing best services to customers and the new levy on Hazira-based CFS’s for their import loaded container nomination was “in line with Adani Ports initiative of ease of doing business in facilitating faster turnaround of CFSs”.
It asked the CFS’s to maintain Pre Deposit Account (PDA) balance at the terminal from 8 September to facilitate invoicing CFS’s nomination charges.
