The Chittagong port is seriously congested, with nearly 40,000 containers piled up, and importers are facing high demurrage charges. The Federation of Bangladesh Chambers of Commerce and Industry and the Chittagong Chamber of Commerce and Industry have called on the government to waive fees to reduce the burden on businesses. Currently, the port yard space is almost saturated and operations are hampered.
In the past week, student protests in Bangladesh have triggered a chain reaction, resulting in highway blockages, curfews and limited Internet services. This series of events has had a serious impact on the Chittagong port. Currently, nearly 40,000 standard containers are piled up at the port terminal, which are mainly loaded with imported goods that need to be processed urgently.
For importers, the situation is even more serious. According to port regulations, huge demurrage charges are incurred when containers stay in the port yard for more than four days. Specifically, a 20-foot container is charged $6 per day from the fifth day, $12 after 12 days, and the fee increases over time, reaching $24 after the 21st day; the fee for a 40-foot container is twice the above standard. This is undoubtedly another heavy blow on top of the huge economic losses caused by factory closures and shipment delays.
In order to reduce the burden on enterprises, the Federation of Bangladesh Chambers of Commerce and Industry and the Chittagong Chamber of Commerce and Industry have called on the government to waive demurrage fees. Last Wednesday, the former made it clear that demurrage fees would be waived within the week and all new fees would be suspended within 15 days after the port operations resumed normal.
In response, Khalid Mahmud Chowdhury, Deputy Minister of Shipping of India, said on the 25th that the government is actively considering the application of enterprises, and pointed out that during the epidemic, the storage fee reduction policy had been implemented for enterprises that could not receive goods in time, and this time it is also possible to make corresponding adjustments according to the actual needs of enterprises.
However, the current situation in Chittagong is still not optimistic. The accumulation of a large number of containers has occupied about 80% of the port yard space, far exceeding the 60% congestion warning line generally believed, which seriously hindered the normal operation of the port. Although Internet connectivity has been gradually restored, the port authority has only been able to handle about 3,500 standard containers per day in the past two days, and the efficiency is far from returning to normal levels.
