Chief Minister Oommen Chandy said here on Monday that Kerala was keen on shifting traffic load from roads to inland and coastal waterways.
He said the State wanted to initiate a discussion with other States to arrive at an appropriate level of taxation to promote coastal shipping. Kerala already provides financial incentives to water transporters, the first State in the country to do so.
Minister for Ports and Excise K. Babu reiterated the government policy declaration and its target of shifting at least 20 per cent of the cargo to the coastal waterways in two years and increase that percentage to 40 by 2020. Non-major ports in Kerala have an estimated traffic potential of 4.64 million tonnes during 2012-14 and seven million by 2019-2020.
