Exporters move for alternative options to break "cartel" of the owners of inland container depots (ICDs) which handle most of Bangladesh's outbound cargoes, as the latter raise charges "unilaterally" and thus make export costlier.
They demand incorporating a provision for the setting up of export-CFS (container freight station) into the draft private ICD policy.
Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA) in a letter this week to the National Board of Revenue (NBR) requested allowing forwarders, warehouse owners and any business group to set up CFS to facilitate outbound trade.
BGMEA president Faruque Hassan placed the demand amid an ongoing row between users and owners of the country's 19 ICDs over a recent charge hike made "unilaterally" on grounds of price hike of fuel oils through a much-contended government decision.
He wrote that CFSs owned by forwarders or warehouse companies are needed to process the export cargoes while ICDs are established to handle export-import and many other multifarious activities.
Elaborating the functions of ICDs Mr Hassan further wrote ICD is a dry-port where CFS and off-docks are its parts. Goods are stuffed and un-stuffed in the containers inside the CFSs while ICD does many other jobs.
On the other hand, he wrote, off-docks are container yards where boxes are stored after bringing them from ports and elsewhere.
The BGMEA president further points out that an export CFS is a small establishment of any size where a shed with a few parking spaces, a crane, and weighbridge are needed. Only the empty containers go there for stuffing goods before being sent to the ports.
Mr Hassan also argues that in almost all countries export cargoes are stuffed in the CFSs owned by multimodal transport operators. In many countries' forwarders and warehousing companies have CFSs according to their requirement.
In India, the letter reads, there are over 2,000 CFSs to facilitate its export industry.
The association chief of the main export industry of Bangladesh further noted that Bangladesh's $28 billion worth of apparel export is dependent on 19 ICDs where trucks sometimes wait nearly 3 days to load or unload cargoes. The exporters themselves pay demurrage to trucks for their stay of extra days.
The existing ICDs lack adequate equipment and are located very close to the port area. On the other hand, the port authority now decided that new ICDs can only be set up 20 kilometres away from the port area, have to have 15 acres of land, and a large number of equipment.
Mr Hassan also points out that the new ICDs would not be able to compete with the existing ones due to their establishment cost and distance from the seaport.
"Since there is hardly any possibility of setting up new ICDs and exporters have no other options but to depend on the existing ICDs, the owners have created a cartel and charging at their will," he says to underpin their demand.
He mentioned that the ICD owners recently increased charges by 23 per cent following oil-price hike though there is no involvement of fuel oils in cargo stuffing.
"They are charging unlawfully," the BGMEA president alleged.
Contacted Wednesday, president of Bangladesh Inland Container Depots Association (BICDA) Nurul Qayyum Khan told the FE that the government has the authority to allow setting up CFS by any exporters and his association has no reservation on this.
He denies that the ICD owners are doing monopolistic business and says they are bound to adjust charges as their cost of operation increased.
"We are facilitating country's export-import trade, and at the same time, bearing blame instead of being praised," said Mr Khan.
He argues that many other service providers have increased charges recently, including shipping costs having been raised several hundred times globally, but they are not blamed for the act.
syful-islam@outlook.com