IWAI aims 120MT inland waterways cargo movement by 2023

Inland Waterways Authority of India (IWAI) on Wednesday said it aims to increase cargo transportation through this mode to 120 million tonne by 2023 from the current 72 million tonne.

IWAI officials said it continues to make crucial interventions that would pave the way for eco-friendly cargo movement on the national waterways.

In this endeavour, the National Waterway-1 is important and IWAI is creating necessary infrastructure to falicitate private investors to rope in the fuel-efficient transport mode, they said.

Adani Logistics, as part of a pilot project, is carrying the largest container cargo in the NH-1 from Haldia to Patna, an IWAI official had said on Tuesday.

The comnpany's inland vessel MV Bhavya began sailing on Tuesday from Haldia docks with 52 containers of edible oil.

The vessel was formally flagged off from Kolkata's Garden Reach Jetty-II by IWAI Chairman Pravir Pandey, Chairman of Kolkata Port Trust Vinit Kumar, along with Adani Ports officials.

The vessel will reach its destination in 9-10 days covering a distance of 955 km.

A number of cargo owners including PepsiCo, Emami Agrotech, IFFCO Fertilisers, Dabur India have already come on board inland waterways.

The movement could be made possible as IWAI has put a "robust ecosystem of fairway, berthing, pilotage, river information systems and night navigation facilities on river Ganga", IWAI officals said.

"Maintenance dredging is being carried out on the NW-1 to ensure the least assured depth of three metres," they said.

A Rs 517-crore multimodal terminal (MMT) at Haldia is being readied, while IWAI is likely to deliver a Rs 281-crore MMT at Sahibganj in Jharkhand in August, the officials added.