Equipment, space shortages crippling Benapole land port

An acute shortage of storage space and unloading equipment is plaguing Benapole land port, resulting in loss of revenue and business.

The port's 42 sheds are supposed to hold 36,000 tonnes of goods but are having to accommodate three times that amount.

The shortage of equipment is met with manual labour, slowing down unloading and release of imported goods and forcing long queues of some 3,000 trucks on the Indian side for days on end.

The congestion is detrimentally affecting bilateral trade with India. The port handles trade worth Tk 30,000 crore annually, earning Tk 5,500 crore in revenue.

Of the equipment, the port has rented nine forklifts and six cranes of different capacities for a year. However, four of the forklifts and four of the cranes have remained inoperable for long.

Those that are in operation frequently break down allegedly for the use of substandard replacement parts.

It is difficult to manually unload raw materials and machinery used in industrial units, including garment factories, said Mofizur Rahman Sazon, president of the Benapole C&F Agents Association.

Had all the equipment been operational, some 300 trucks could be unloaded every day.

However, the daily average had been around 50 before the pandemic and even lesser now for the drop in economic activities, said the port authorities.

The equipment provider is not responding to calls for proper equipment and Bangladesh Land Port Authority has been informed of the matter,said the port's Deputy Director Md Mamun Tarafdar.

Hopefully, the problem will be solved very soon, he said.