Indian Ports Association (IPA) has released data which shows an increase of 4.13 per cent in cargo traffic at country's 12 major ports which amounts to 221.95 million tonnes (MT) in April-July period of the current fiscal.
These top ports, under the administrative control of the Centre, had handled 213.15 MT cargo in the April-July period of the last fiscal.
India has 12 major ports, namely Kandla, Mumbai, JNPT, Mormugao, New Mangalore, Cochin, Chennai, Ennore, V O Chidambaranar, Visakhapatnam, Paradip and Kolkata (including Haldia), which handle approximately 61 per cent of the country's total cargo traffic.
Increased demand from sectors like iron ore, petroleum oil and lubricants (POL) and containers led to higher movement of cargo during the last four months, according to the Indian Ports Association (IPA).
The data revealed that iron ore traffic volumes moved up 32.28 per cent to 15.61 MT during April-July as against 11.80 MT in the same period a year ago, while those of POL rose 10.40 per cent to 75.18 MT. Container traffic rose 6.16 per cent to 44.06 MT.
According to the data, the Kandla port handled the highest traffic volume at 36.10 MT during April-July this year, followed by the Paradip port at 32.93 MT and JNPT at 21.84 MT.