ARISING from a stakeholders meeting in Lagos yesterday, the Nigerian Ports Authority, NPA has directed all shipping companies operating in Nigeria to establish a holding bay for the storage of empty containers and coordinate the movements of such containers back to the ports.
In a notice to all stakeholders operating in the ports, the leadership of the Truck Transit Parks Limited, NPA partners engaged to manage the movement of trucks in and out of the port, said that the new procedure for the return of empty containers is one of the measures the authority has taken to further ease the congested terminals and the port corridor.
In the notice, the NPA has also directed the immediate enforcement of Standard Operating Procedure guiding the return of empty containers by all operators.
According to the notice, it is now mandatory for all shipping companies to indicate on their Terminal Delivery Order, TDO, the holding bay where their empty containers are to be returned to by truck drivers.
Part of the notice reads: “Following the outcome of the recent stakeholders’ engagement aimed at addressing the upsurge in traffic along the port corridor and the challenges it poses, the Nigerian Ports Authority, NPA, has modified and directed the immediate enforcement of the established Standard Operating Procedure, SOP, guiding the return of empty containers to the port by operators.
“In the light of the foregoing, henceforth, the procedure for the return of empty containers to the ports will reflect the following activities as prerequisites which in the fact that all shipping lines involved in container operations must have an empty container holding bay ( the holding bay must be approved by NPA indicating on the Eto platform) where their empty containers will be returned to by the truck driver after off-loading the contents.
It is therefore mandatory for shipping companies to indicate on the TDO the holding bays where they want their empty containers to be returned to.
“The transferring of empty containers to the ports will be exclusively managed and coordinated by respective shipping lines in conjunction with the holding bays.
“The truck driver returning containers to ports shall comply with the time belt allocated for such purpose.”
