EPB plans policy to clear backlog at ports

PUNE, Aug 16: The Export Promotion Board is expected to announce its policy to clear the huge backlog of imported goods currently clogging the country’s ports. This decision should be out next month, ministry of commerce additional secretary Nripendra Mishra told The Indian Express.

The backlog at the ports, some of which is over a year old, has caused a bottleneck, Mishra admitted. The goods, which should have been auctioned off after 30 days of being uncleared, have now piled up to `menacing proportions’ which he declined to quantify either in numbers of value. This pile up has occurred at ports, mainly at Mumbai and Chennai, and at airports as well.

Mishra, who will preside over the Scope air and shipping meetings at Jaipur next month, said the meeting would focus mainly on procedural simplification for goods movement and would include the huge backlog of uncleared goods.

The country’s first private air cargo complex, providing custodian services for export cargoes on the lines of a container freight station (CFS), is being mooted for Pune.