Benapole cargo vehicle terminal to be inaugurated in October

BENAPOLE, Sept 21: The construction of cargo vehicle terminal in Benapole land port, aiming to reduce congestion substantially, has been completed.

The port authorities said the terminal built at a cost of more than Tk3.29 billion (Tk329 crore) will be inaugurated in October this year.

The terminal constructed under one of the country's largest projects can accommodate 1,200 to 1,500 cargo trucks at a time. As a result, suffering will decrease and export-import trade will increase, expect the authorities.

According to the sources, the cargo vehicle terminal has been constructed on about 24 acres of land and out of the total expenditure, Tk1.09 billion (Tk109 crore) was allocated for land acquisition and Tk 2.2 billion (Tk220 crore) for construction work.

Trade with India through Benapole land port in Jashore has increased manifold due to easy road and rail connectivity: so sufferings in transportation of goods have also increased accordingly.

And to overcome this crisis and to increase the capacity of the land port, the project titled Construction of Cargo Vehicle Terminal at Benapole was taken up by the authorities.

Benapole Land Port Deputy Director Rashedul Sajib Nazir said construction work of the project started in February 2022 after necessary land acquisition.

The total construction cost of the project is Tk3.29billion (Tk329 crore) and the terminal has an accommodation capacity of 1,200 to 1,500 trucks, he added.

Under the project, parking yard, cargo building, port service building, utility building, fire station, modern toilet complex, weighbridge scale and other infrastructures have been constructed at the modern and attractive terminal. The terminal can be turned on when power is connected.

The terminal's commissioning will ease the day-long congestion in the port and increase its mobility.

Four contractor firms are working on the Benapole land port cargo vehicle terminal project.

They are TBEAL. They have built boundary walls and gates, toilets, barrack building, open yard and operation building etc. After that, ATTL company has done the work of setting up scanner (by customs authorities) and another company ST Technology Limited has done the work of installing CC cameras.

India Bangladesh Chamber of Commerce and Industry Director Motiar Rahman said, "The construction of cargo vehicle terminal has been well done to ease traffic congestion. I have come to know that the infrastructures that have been built here are up-to-date and of good quality."

He added, "If this terminal is inaugurated, congestion of goods will surely reduce and sufferings will certainly come down as well. Because of that our revenue income will also increase."

According to the sources, about 7,000 to 8,000 tonnes of goods are imported through the land port from India every day. As a result, many products are kept under the open sky due to space constraint.

Besides, Indian trucks lie in wait in the port day after day with goods. Unloading is a problem due to lack of space. The port users think that this problem will go away if the terminal is opened.

According to official statistics, Benapole port collected Tk 24.25billion (Tk 2,425 crore) revenue in the financial year 2011-12 which increased to Tk 57.86 billion (Tk 5,786 crore) in the financial year 2022-23.

On the other hand, the amount of import increased from 1.5million tonnes to 2.035 million tonnes (20,35,499) last year.

Project director and supervising engineer of the port Hasan Ali said, "The cargo vehicle terminal has been built maintaining highest quality standard through Buet, Kuet and our own laboratory tests."

He expressed the hope that the electricity connection work will be completed by next week.

He said, "If the terminal opens, both the capacity and revenue of the port will increase. It will facilitate trade between the two neighbouring countries."

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