Container handling at Chittagong port up 6.5% in four months

Loading and unloading became quicker as ships were taking less time to dock at the jetty leading to shorter average stays, the port authority says

Container handling has gone up by 6.5 percent at Chittagong Sea Port, the country’s largest seaport in the first four months of the current fiscal year. However, the number of ships coming to the port has dropped and the quantity of cargo processed has decreased.

The port authorities say they look at the increase in container handling and the shorter average stay of ships positively.

The unrest in the country around August has begun to ebb, which was ‘good news’ for traders and should continue, said Chittagong Shipping Agents Association Director Khairul Alam Sujon.

A smaller number of ships coming to the port did not mean that imports and exports have declined, the director explained. Earlier, 1,200 to 1,500 containers used to come in each of the smaller sized ships whereas bigger ships were now carrying 2,000 containers each, he said.

The scale of the progress will become evident at the beginning of the new year, he said.

More than 1.1 million TEU (Twenty-feet Equivalent Unit) containers were handled by the Chittagong Port from July to October in the 2024-25 fiscal year, according to Chittagong Port Authority.

The figure was 1,030,757 TEUs over the same period in 2023. Hence, 71,160 more containers, equivalent to a 6.45 percent increase, were handled this year. At least 1,023,739 TEUs were handled in the same period in 2022.

A total of 271,335 TEUs were handled in July, 271,869 in August, 283,324 in September and 275,389 in October.

Meanwhile, more than 39 million tonnes of cargo were handled in July, August, September and October in the current fiscal year. The figure stood at 40 million tonnes in the same period in 2023. Hence, cargo handling dropped by 1.4 tonnes.

As many as 1,281 ships arrived in Chittagong Port in the last four months, 161 fewer than the total number of ships arriving in the same period last year. In 2023, 1,392 ships arrived over this period and 1,460 in 2022.

Chittagong Port has recovered from the crisis it faced, said Chittagong Port Authority Secretary Md Omar Faruk. The increase in container handling has proven that, he said. Besides, the number of containers stuck at the port dropped with the improvement of the overall situation.

It was not important that the number of ships arriving at the port had dropped, the secretary said. Because small ships used to carry a small number of containers in the past. Now big ships were docking at the jetty carrying more containers, he said.

The port secretary believes the increase in container handling showed the increased capacity and progress of the port’s activities.

At a press briefing last Tuesday, Chittagong Port Authority Chairman Rear Admiral SM Maniruzzaman also highlighted the progress in container handling in the last three months following the July movement.

He said 80 million TEU containers were handled in the last three months, which was 76,986 more than those handled in the same period last year. The growth in container handling was 10.22 percent.

The number of dumped containers in the port was 45,500 on Jul 16, equivalent to 85 percent of the port’s capacity, the chairman said. The number dropped to 34,000 in the last three months, he said. Also, the average stay of ships at the port went down to one day.