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Colombo International Container Terminals (CICT) has reported a throughput of 2 million teu for the 12 months ending 31st December 2016, achieving an impressive year-on-year growth of 28%. The success of CICT has helped the port of Colombo overall achieve throughput growth in each of the past three years. In 2016, Colombo saw its container traffic levels grow by 11% compared with 2015, with CICT leading the way.
CICT points out that very large containerships, many of a size that only its Colombo South Terminal is capable of handling, had contributed 70 % to the volumes it achieved in 2016.
CICT general manager, commercial and marketing, Tissa Wickramasinghe, added: “It must be emphasised that this historic achievement of 2 million teu was made possible mainly by the synergies developed through our parent company China Merchants Port Holdings (CMPH). The ability to access the CMPH global network was the key factor in gaining and attracting new transhipment volumes to the Port of Colombo. With the introduction of new services and new shipping lines, CICT has set the trend for the Port of Colombo to stave off international competition for the highly sensitive and volatile transhipment cargo, in a depleted global shipping market.”
Besides its significant contributions to the growth of the Port of Colombo in volume terms, CICT is also responsible for several firsts in service innovation and eco-friendly operations. In 2016, for example, the company launched a US$ 10 million programme to convert its fleet of diesel operated RTG cranes to electricity driven cranes (E-RTGs), which have zero carbon emissions.
