Logistics industry rattled
The logistics and freight forwarding business in Bangladesh has been devastated by the global coronavirus pandemic, which has resulted in a nosedive in transportation of goods by land, air and sea.
Of the 3.5 lakh-odd trucks and covered vans engaged in the transportation of goods between Dhaka, its adjacent districts and Chittagong port, nearly 70 per cent carry textile and garment items, as the rest transport products for other sectors.
And since most of the garment factories are actually closed, their business has hit rock-bottom, industry insiders said.
Through the shutdown, transportation of other goods like vegetables and construction materials is quite scarce, said Syed Md Bakhtiar, executive president of Bangladesh Truck and Covered Van Owners Association.
The common price of a truck or van is Tk 20 lakh and it fetches them Tk 2.5 lakh per month.
"Although we've no income now, we need to pay salaries of the drivers and other staff," he said, adding that there is also to pay loans as the majority of the vehicles were bought on credit.
The 30.5 lakh persons directly and indirectly used in the sector are sitting idle now, Bakhtiar added.
Freight forwarding business has also come to a halt due to the new situation, said Kabir Ahmed, president of the Bangladesh Freight Forwarders Association (BAFFA).
For example, on a usual day, some 600 tonnes of cargoes are imported via Hazrat Shahjalal AIRPORT TERMINAL but the quantity has dropped to only 250 tonnes a day now.
About 800 tonnes of goods were exported through the airport on a standard day, however the volume has fallen to 50 tonnes.
Of the export consignments sent through the airport, 70 % are textile and garment items.
The cargo village at the airport is also taking the strain because of slow delivery of goods amid the ongoing countrywide movement control order: though about 250 tonnes goods accumulate in the cargo village each day, only 50 tonnes are delivered.
So far more than 2,000 tonnes of goods have already been stockpiled in the cargo village that has a capacity of 800 tonnes.
Subsequently, valuable goods are left beneath the open sky and unattended, resulting in deterioration in their quality, Ahmed said.
The BAFFA is planning to seek faster delivery of goods from the cargo village from the customs commissioner, he said, adding they have informed the commerce ministry the other day that the freight forwarders have incurred losses of Tk 1,500 crore over the last one . 5 months.
Moazzem Hossain, commissioner of Dhaka customs house, said they are working 7 days per week to deliver the imported goods from the cargo village at the airport.
Many importers are not taking delivery of their goods promptly, which has led to congestion at the cargo village, he added.
M Mafidur Rahman, chairman of the Civil Aviation Authority of Bangladesh, also said they are providing round-the-clock services for faster delivery of the imported goods from the Dhaka airport.
But the backlog doesn't seem to be unscrambling fast enough.
SHIPPING INDUSTRY IN A ROUGH PATCH
The container shipping industry that was first dealt a blow in January by an import crunch amid the coronavirus outbreak in China is facing new shocks now.
Though import volume slightly increased since February with Chinese factories little by little resuming production, the sector is bogged down by a dearth of export consignments and container congestion at Chattogram port.
Import of containerised cargo through the port fell 16.70 per cent to 108,718 TEUs (twenty feet equivalent units) in February from the prior month, according to data from shipping agents.
A complete of 134 container vessels attained the port in February, against 154 in January.
Since the majority of the raw materials for the garment sector are brought from China, the supply was heavily disrupted in January and February when Chinese factories suspended production, said Shahed Sarwar, deputy managing director of Chowdhury Group, local agent of feeder operating businesses Feedertech and Foremost Maritime.
Vessels hardly get 40 % of the expected import cargoes although some vessels had to remain idle.
"We'd to drop one of the vessels from our fleet," he added.
Since the the other day of March the volume of export consignments has been witnessing a drastic fall as the majority of the neighborhood garment factories remain closed, Sarwar said.
A vessel named Delaware Trader that left the port on April 4 got only 590 TEUs of export containers, as the vessel used to ship 2,200 TEUs to 2,300 TEUs on usual days.
Md Ajmir Hossain Chowdhury, assistant general manager of the ship's local agent Marco Shipping Company (BD), said feeder operators are counting huge losses for carrying such a poor number of export containers.
Slow delivery of imported goods from Chattogram port has generated acute container congestion leading to long queues of vessels. A complete of 36 container vessels were waiting at the outer anchorage yesterday.
Vessels are actually forced to hold back for seven to eight days at the outer anchorage and therefore the operators are counting a huge amount of losses since they need to bear yet another charge of $10,000 to $16,000 for each day of idle stay, said Ahsanul Hoque Chowdhury, chairman of Bangladesh Shipping Agents Association.
