Major ports in India have recorded a cargo traffic growth of 4.58% and together handled 560.97 million tonnes (MT) of merchandise during the period April 2017 to January 2018, as against 536.41 MT handled during the corresponding period of previous year.
 
For the period, 8 ports i.e. Kolkata (including Haldia), Paradip, Visakhapatnam, Chennai, Cochin, New Mangalore, JNPT and Deendayal have registered positive growth in traffic, a Ministry of Shipping statement said today.
 
The highest growth was registered by Cochin Port (18.36%) followed by Paradip (16.01%), Kolkata (including  Haldia) (13.47%), New Mangalore (7.37%) and JNPT (5.95%).
 
Traffic growth at Cochin Port was mainly due to increase in traffic of POL (24.54%), containers (11.45%) and other Cargo (1.02%).
In Kolkata Port, overall growth was 13.47% . Kolkata Dock System (KDS) registered traffic growth of 1.12% whereas Haldia Dock Complex  (HDC) registered a positive growth of 19.63%, which is the highest among all the major ports.
 
During the period April 2017 to January 2018, Deendayal (Kandla) Port handled the highest volume of traffic i.e. 90.99 Million tonnes (16.22% share) followed by Paradip with 84.57 million tonnes (15.08% share), JNPT with 54.52 million tonnes (9.72% share), Mumbai with 52.71 million tonnes (9.40% share), and Visakhapatnam with 52.44 million tonnes (9.35% share).
 
Together, these five ports handled around 60% of Major Port Traffic.