Imported goods worth millions of takas are lying under the open sky in Benapole land port due to a shortage of storage space and a cumbersome clearance process at the land port
The quality of the products is deteriorating, which in turn is causing financial losses to the importers, reports bdnews24.com.
Importers blamed the delay in clearing the imported goods on dysfunctional cranes and forklifts at the port.
They are now worried that the border trade could cease unless the problems are addressed soon.
“The Benapole port has a 25-tonne capacity forklift and five forklifts each with a capacity to lift five tonnes. Four of those five-tonne forklifts have been out of order for a long time. The 25-tonne forklift also broke down in a devastating blow to the entire system of goods handling,” said Jamal Hossain, joint general secretary of Benapole C & F Association.
The port has three cranes with a capacity ranging from 19 tonnes to 40 tonnes along with two that are capable of lifting up to 10 tonnes of goods, he added.
At least, five of these cranes remain out of order at most times.
“As there’s a lack of space, newly imported goods are only moved to the warehouse when the older ones are cleared. Trucks loaded with imported goods remain inside the port for many days. Even if they receive permission to unload the trucks, port users can’t manage a crane or forklift to extract the goods. Thus they face a lot of trouble,” said Sajedur Rahman, general secretary of C&F Staff Association.
Although the contractor company was notified about the issue on several occasions, they are yet to address the problem, said Abdul Jalil, acting director of Benapole Land Port. “We have written to the Bangladesh Land Port Authority and hope that the problem will be solved soon.”
The port users alleged that some ‘unscrupulous officials and staffers’ of the port along with some drivers and engineers as their cohorts ‘intentionally’ are involved in keeping the cranes and forklifts dysfunctional.
Some old spare machinery parts are brought to fix the cranes and forklift. For this reason cranes and forklift become inactive again shortly afterwards.
The majority of the machinery used in the country’s industrial factories, garment factories and in different projects are imported through this port, said India Bangladesh Chamber of Commerce Director Matiar Rahman.
These machineries cannot be loaded or unloaded without a crane or a forklift. The port, with a capacity to store 51,000 tonnes of goods, sees 80,000 tonnes to 100,000 tonnes of goods being loaded and unloaded every day.
The regular activities of the port will be disrupted if the problems with the storage and heavy-lifting equipment are not solved, he warned.
“To address the issue, the authorities already constructed two big yards worth Tk 870 million to increase the storage capacity. Also, we have acquired 25 acres of land and another 16 acres will be acquired soon,” Benapole Land Port Authority Deputy Director Mamun Kabir said.
A cargo vehicle terminal will be constructed in Benapole with a budget of Tk 2.89 billion, soon after the coronavirus crisis ebbs, according to him. This, he believes, will redress most of the problems at the port.