Dry Ports Cannot Work Without Rail Connection – Experts

• Dry Ports Cannot Work Without Rail Connection – Experts

The Inland Dry Seaports also known as Inland Container Depots cannot work if they are not connected to rail, according to stakeholders in the maritime sector.

The ICDs are freight stations established by the Federal Government in areas where there is no quick access to seaports.

They are like seaports located in the rural hinterland with all the loading and off-loading equipment needed to handle containers which are brought to the depots by rail or road.

According to the Nigerian Shippers’ Council, six locations have been approved for the ICDs which were given through concession to private sector operators by the ICD Implementation Committee of the Federal Ministry of Transportation.

The locations are said to include Isiala Ngwa, Aba, Erunmu, Ibadan, Heipang, Jos, Zawachiki, Kano, Zamfarawa, Funtua, Jauri and Maiduguri.

The council had announced that President Muhammadu Buhari would inaugurate the first ICD in Kaduna on Thursday (today).

The Kaduna Area Officer of the NSC, Bala Adamu, said in May that the manifest for cargoes destined for the ICD Kaduna would read ‘Lagos/Kaduna’, meaning that such cargoes would first land in the Lagos port from where they would be moved to the Kaduna ICD without examination.

The Director of Special Duties, NSC, Ignatius Nweke, was quoted in a statement as saying that the facility had the capacity to handle 29,000 tonnes of cargoes yearly and was expected to generate over 5,000 direct employments at the commencement of operations.

But the Chairman, International Freight Forwarders Association, Mr. Sunny Nnebe, argued that unless the depots were linked to rail system, they would not serve the purpose for which they were established.

The Coordinator of Save Nigeria Freight Forwarders, Dr. Osita Chukwu, observed that of all the seaports in Nigeria, only Apapa had been linked to rail line, noting that unless the situation improved, the government was just wasting money on the dry ports.

“The roads are bad; the only effective way to make use of container depots would be through rail connecting the depots and the seaports, otherwise cargo still has to be transported through the bad roads to the dry ports with all the attendant challenges,” he noted.

The President, Shippers Association of Lagos State, Jonathan Nicol, said that for the ICDs to succeed, the government had to provide the necessary infrastructure, including good rail and road networks.

Nicole said, “Our rail system from Apapa Port/Tin Can Island Port must be operational. It is a starting point for the ICD unless we want to move those containers, which do not make sense to me, by road and you are not bringing them to another terminal. It will be very expensive to do so.

“The ICDs are set up when you have a workable railway system and that is what I will advise the government to do, especially in Apapa where we have railway facility. Once it is working, then, your ICD will succeed. But in the absence of that, there will be bottlenecks here and there.”