Cashew traders and processing units in the city are relieved now that mainline vessels with cashew cargo come calling at Mangalore port, directly to destination instead of being routed through Sri Lanka.
The cashew processing industry in Mangalore depends on various countries for cashew. It had been depending on imports because of the shrinking quantity of cashew within India as the area under cultivation as well as the season had reduced.
Five years ago, Mangalore processed 25,000 to 30,000 tonnes of cashew. Last year, it was 1,50,000 tonnes of cashew, a quantity that was only set to increase, according to Prakash Rao Kalbhavi, former president, the Karnataka Cashew Manufacturers Association (KCMA).
The change in transport facility had cut handling charges, slashed the transit time substantially, and enabled traders to improve the quality of the nut and get repeat orders. The mainline vessels were calling because of high volumes of cashew imports required for processing by the cashew processing industry in Mangalore and the incentives for berthing provided by the New Mangalore Port Trust (NMPT).
The time taken for ships coming from East Africa had reduced from 14 days to 7 days. Vessels coming from West Africa reached the port in 12 days as against 28 days earlier.
Partially dried nuts used to start “sweating” (emitting moisture that can damage the nuts) in the absence of mainline vessels. Traders here had to arrest further damage. Now, the problem of delay did not exist, said Walter D'Souza, former chairman of the Cashew Export Promotion Council of India (CEPCI).
Traditionally, traders depended heavily on Colombo and feeder vessels, which would take up to 35 days to reach Mangalore.
The turnaround time was very high, up to 10 days. Also, there were problems with berthing between two ports.
Once the feeder vessel missed a mother vessel, getting connected again to another mother vessel would take 5 to 12 days, upsetting all shipping schedules, said Mr. D'Souza.
“The Colombo port had been congested for the past one year and it is going from bad to worse,” said Mr. D'Souza.
NMPT had facilitated direct berthing for mainline vessels. “We have ensured that there was zero waiting time for mainline vessels. Also, a reduction of 25 per cent had been made for mainline vessels on port dues collected by NMPT on trade, pilotage, and berth-hire charges,” said S. Gopalakrishna, Traffic Manager, NMPT.
Mr. Kalbhavi said: “Higher volumes handled by the mainline vessels had made it viable for them to come calling at Mangalore.
The NMPT has played the role of a catalyst in getting them into Mangalore port. The reduced time is a great boon to us.”
He said cashew from Matwara Tanzania now reached even before the couriered documents reached him there.
On December 2, mainline vessel CMA CGM Okapi was calling in at the Mangalore Port with 150 or 200 boxes of cashew from Tanzania.
In East Africa, the cashew season was from May to July with the cargo appearing in Mangalore a month later.
In West Africa, the season was from November to early January, and the cashew appears month later in Mangalore ideally.
