Incentives from both the Philippine Ports Authority (PPA) and Manila port operators await cargo owners who will pull out their overstaying cargoes this coming weekend.
“Twenty percent of the arrastre, which is the PPA, the government share, will be waived for anybody who releases their container between 00:01 on Sunday to 12 noon on Monday to encourage people to come on that lean weekend,” Christian Gonzalez, Asia Pacific region head of International Container Terminal Services, Inc. (ICTSI), told reporters in a press conference on September 8.
The port executive said port operators will also give rebates for retrievals of overstaying containers on the coming weekend.
Specifically, ICTSI and South Harbor operator Asian Terminals Inc. (ATI) will waive storage fees for the sixth to tenth day of storage for cargo owners who withdraw their cargoes this coming weekend. Cargoes are given five days of free storage after being cleared and issued a gate pass by Customs.
Gonzalez said port operators will issue “credit memos” that cargo owners can use on the following weekends. The implementing guidelines for the incentives will be released within the week.
The measures could increase weekend pullout of containers by threefold or fourfold, according to Ernesto Ordoñez, private sector representative of Federation of Philippine Industries, Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Alyansa Agrikultura, Management Association of the Philippines, and Makati Business Club.
An average of 150 trucks move in and out of the Manila South Harbor during Sundays and none on Monday mornings, against the 1,400 daily average of truck movements during weekdays, according to ATI vice president Sean Perez.
ICTSI’s Gonzalez said weekend and Monday morning truck movements at Manila International Container Port (MICP) usually reach no more than 500 to 700 containers, including the spill-over from Saturday noon. On September 7 when the “last mile” route started, there were about 1,300 container pullouts at MICP.
The last mile route allows cargo trucks servicing Manila ports to deliver shipments to warehouses outside of the express trade lanes and even during truck ban hours from September 8 to 22. But this is on condition that trucks also pull out containers on Sunday and until Monday before 12 noon (Sept 7-8 and Sept 14-15).
The last mile route is just one of a string of measures adopted to ease port congestion in the ports of Manila. Other measures include transferring Customs-cleared overstaying boxes in Manila ports to Subic and Batangas ports starting September 8; and fining, beginning October 1, owners of Customs-cleared overstaying containers P5,000 per day beyond the free five-day storage period.
CCPC decongestion target
Cabinet Secretary Jose Rene Almendras, chairman of the Cabinet Cluster on Port Congestion (CCPC), said the government targets to significantly decongest the Port of Manila by the end of the month, but clarifies that other issues will still need to be fixed afterward since the problem is “quite complex.”
“We now want to address the (issue of the) empties,” he told PortCalls after the press conference.
“There are sites that have been identified and there are steps that the shipping companies are expected to do,” he added.
Almendras said the CCPC eyes opening additional container yards as soon as possible along the major thoroughfares linked to trade routes.
“Actually the other option is move all the containers to Subic where there’s a lot of space. That’s something that (we) can do immediately,” he added.
According to Atty Maximino Cruz, Association of International Shipping Lines general manager, the 11 existing container depots have a capacity of only 24,700 TEUs, but are now housing 30,000 TEUs.
The Container Depot Association of the Philippines told PortCalls in a separate email that the current capacity of its member-yards has exceeded 100%.
By end of October, there will be an additional space for empty containers, however, with the use of MICT’s Berth 7, said ICTSI’s Gonzalez.
He said ICTSI is looking to get the berth to handle 7,000 containers.
DPWH clearing operations
For his part, Public Works Secretary Rogelio Singson said DPWH will send a letter to the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority (MMDA) this week seeking to “redeem the road space” on Road 10 and C3 Road that has been either obstructed by illegal settlers or turned into garages and garbage sites.
Singson noted that the department already informed Manila Vice Mayor Francisco Domagoso of the planned clearing operations.
Meantime, MMDA and the National Capital Region Police Office plan to handle traffic on national roads where trucks ply to avoid the road build-up that paralyzed traffic on September 5 along the North Luzon Expressway. – Roumina Pablo
