E-Paper
A cheerful year for shipping industry
From booming freight rates to tonnage tax announcement, industry continues to sail ahead with substantial additions to its fleet.
From booming freight rates to tonnage tax announcement, the Indian shipping industry continues to sail ahead with substantial additions to its fleet in 2004 to catapult itself among the top ten maritime nations of the world.
The year has left many reasons to cheer about the shipping industry as a maritime policy is on the anvil.
The year witnessed heavyweight projects like the Rs 1,800 crore Sethu Samudram on the east coast, Rs 1,000 crore third container terminal at Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust (JNPT) in Mumbai and the Rs 2,000 crore International Container Transhipment Terminal (ICTT) at Vallarpadam in Kochi.
With the UPA Government in power, the ambitious Rs 1,00,000 crore Sagar Mala programme, a brain child of NDA Government, was rechristened as National Maritime Development Programme (NMDP).
The trends in the freight markets have been eventful with record rise in freight rates for almost all sectors. In the dry bulk sector, the Capesize rates, which hit $1,00,000 a day in January, dropped to $75,000 per day in October while Panamax earnings maintained its levels of $40,000 a day.
The tanker market too marked a rise in rates with earnings for Very Large Crude Carrier (VLCC) crossing $100,000 per day while Suezmax rates remained steady.
The strong freight market was well supported by the Government with the introduction of a tonnage tax with effect from 2004-05 financial year as part of the Budget proposals.
The Indian fleet strength increased from 616 ships of 10.06 million dead weight tonne (dwt) as on March 2003 to 639 ships of 11.43 million dwt as on March 2004 and sailed ahead to 665 ships of 12.72 million dwt, which is an all-time record.
According to Indian National Shipowners' Association (INSA), India would cross 10 million gross tonne mark and perhaps move further to improve its tonnage ranking so as to be among the top ten maritime nations, if the present trend in acquisition of tonnage continues.
