PRC India 2017: Changes afoot
PRC India 2017: Changes afoot
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India’s import and export community is getting familiar with an alphabet soup of initiatives being introduced by India’s customs and transportation ministries in their attempts to make international commerce in that nation easier.
Attendees of a logistics-focused session at the 2017 Paper Recycling Conference India, held in February in Mumbai, heard about port clearance and customs initiatives designed to allow traders and consumers of scrap paper to get raw materials to each other faster.
Sharat Chandrayan of CONCOR said the Indian shipping firm operates the largest rail freight network in India and has been investing to increase the capacity and speed of its inland routes. In particular, CONCOR has been setting up a Dedicated Freight Corridor (DFC) between Mumbai and Delhi to reduce the average journey time for rail freight between those two cities from 48 hours to 24 hours.
The DFC also includes the construction of industrial parks, known as multi-modal logistic parks (MMPLs), with warehouse and assembly space, says Chandrayan. He says those in the paper recycling and paper converting chain will be encouraged to locate there. “That is the essence of the MMPLs,” he commented.
CONCOR also is involved with setting up the DPD (Direct Port Delivery) program, which Chandrayan says is designed “to cut out the fat” between the shipping lines and end customers. With its intention to “cut down the layers” of the shipping process, the DPD system already has captured 50% of the market, said the CONCOR vice president.
Sohel Khazani of Mumbai-based Bharat Freight said the DPD can continue to grow its market share, as prior criteria that reserved the service for higher-volume shippers has been dropped.
He said several “gaps” remain in India’s shipping and logistics systems, including India’s crowded holiday schedules, roadway congestion (especially leading to and from seaports), and a lack of training on how to use new online interfaces set up by government ministries and shipping lines.
Anil Radhakrishnan, CEO of Gurgaon, India-based Adani Logistics Ltd., cited the 2016-2017 Indian government fiscal year budget of 2.41 trillion rupees ($36 billion) for infrastructure development as one reason why he feels “there is a concerted effort” to reduce logistics costs in the nation. “They are listening,” he said of government officials.
Radhakrishnan also pointed to India’s unifying goods and services tax (GST) structure as another reason to be optimistic. “That is a positive—a government that is willing to listen and is ready to move.”
S.C. Joshi of Mumbai-based Ajay Logistics Pvt. Ltd. urged conference delegates to consider the transportation sector as “a partner to the paper industry.”
Nonetheless, with shipping lines consolidating and some routes now with reduced capacity after the Hanjin bankruptcy, “the cost of freight will be going high,” stated Joshi.
Conference delegates confirmed that point of view in the question-and-answer and discussion periods afterward, with several expressing concerns that shipping costs have made it impossible for mills to buy imported recovered fibre in early 2017.
The 2017 Paper Recycling Conference India was 6 and 7 February at The Leela Hotel in Mumbai.
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Source: Recycling Today
PRC India 2017: Changes afoot
<![CDATA[India’s import and export community is getting familiar with an alphabet soup of initiatives being introduced by India’s customs and transportation ministries in their attempts to make international commerce in that nation easier. Attendees of a logistics-focused session at the 2017 Paper Recycling Conference India, held in February in Mumbai, heard about port clearance and customs initiatives designed to allow traders and consumers of scrap paper to get raw materials to each other faster. Sharat Chandrayan of CONCOR said the Indian shipping firm operates the largest rail freight network in India and has been investing to increase the capacity and speed of its inland routes. In particular, CONCOR has been setting up a Dedicated Freight Corridor (DFC) between Mumbai and Delhi to reduce the average journey time for rail freight between those two cities from 48 hours to 24 hours. The DFC also includes the construction of industrial parks, known as multi-modal logistic parks (MMPLs), with warehouse and assembly space, says Chandrayan. He says those in the paper recycling and paper converting chain will be encouraged to locate there. “That is the essence of the MMPLs,” he commented. CONCOR also is involved with setting up the…