The first consignment of wheat for the year 2012 on behalf of Government of India was exported from port of Pipavav on Thursday. The vessel MV Spar Canis sailed from the port with a total of 36,750.082 MT on board. The cargo is being exported by the government to Pt Indofood Sukses in Jakarta, Indonesia.
In this regard, the port has tied up with the Food Corporation of India (FCI) to handle part of its wheat exports. The cargo was stored at Central Warehousing Corporation warehouses. The channelising agent on behalf of FCI was MMTC and the trading partner was Louis Dreyfus.
Despite heavy rains at the port, the operations team achieved a much higher rate of loading than committed and reduced the turnaround time for the vessel by 26 hours.
"This is an important milestone for us. We were keen to deliver high levels of customer satisfaction to FCI, MMTC, and Louis Deryfus," said Capt. Dinesh Lokapure, head, bulk business, APM Terminals, Pipavav. "Handling wheat cargo calls for a number of special arrangements and extra effort to maintain professional and efficient movement and I am glad that my team achieved excellent results."
Raman from Louis Drefyus, said, "At the outset, our congratulations on smooth and efficient handling of the wheat shipment per MV SPAR CANIS. The performance has been above our expectations. We are definitely looking at port Pipavav as one of the gateway ports for our bulk export shipments."
Pipavav handles coal, fertilisers, iron ore, scrap and other bulk commodities. New storage space and equipment have been added to the port's facilities to handle wheat henceforth. The port is expanding its infrastructure facilities.
