A special storage facility for handling raw cotton at Dakshin Bharat Gateway Container Terminal at V.O. Chidambaranar Port Trust was inaugurated by Chairman S. Anantha Chandra Bose on Friday.
As part of its ‘Ease of doing business’ initiative, VOC Port has planned to accommodate around 500 units of 40 foot container in the custom-bonded area of Dakshin Bharat Gateway Container Terminal to store raw cotton.
The raw cotton can be stocked for a period of 30 days at no cost. The Department of Customs has also issued necessary guidelines for handling imported raw cotton and storage in the facility.
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The prime objective is to facilitate international cotton traders to bring cotton and store it in the Port yards and sell the cotton either to mills in India and to have the leverage of selling it to other countries as well. It is pertinent to note that the above facility will aid textile mills to get cotton at the international price within a short span of one week, thereby increasing yarn production in Tamil Nadu.
The facility would have a rippling effect by strengthening the textile value chain particularly knitting, weaving, garmenting, textile processing, apparel sector etc. and through providing employment opportunities for more than one lakh people of Tamil Nadu.
In addition, it will also lead to parity in cotton price at the Indian market. In order to give impetus to the import of containerised raw cotton, V.O. Chidambaranar Port has also agreed to levy nominal rent on the containers carrying raw cotton handled at the Port by the traders.
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In the second phase, a Free Trade Warehousing Zone (FGTWZ) will be established in the Port Estate with the creation of world-class infrastructure for warehousing of raw cotton, state-of-the-art equipment, transportation and handling facilities, commercial office-space, water, power, communications and connectivity, with one-stop clearance of import and export formality to support the integrated zones as ‘international trading hubs.’
V.O. Chidambaranar Port has already identified 52.40 hectares of land in the Port area for establishing FGTWZ and the Port is in the process of finalising the detailed project report for the same.
Commissioner of Customs, Thoothukudi, K.V.V.G. Diwakar, Deputy Chairman, V.O. Chidambaranar Port Trust S. Natarajan, Chairman, the Southern India Mills’ Association (SIMA), M. Senthil Kumar and senior officials of the port were present.