Prime Minister Narendra Modi dedicated to the nation three key projects related to the petroleum sector in Bihar on Sunday via video conferencing.

The year 2018 has been a significant one for the logistic and shipping sector in India.

In an exclusive interview, Kailash Agarwal, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Shipping, reveals that a roadmap has been created for increasing the Indian port capacity to 3,500+ MMTPA to more than cater to the projected traffic of 2,500 MMTPA by 2025.

Nandan Yalgi, Managing Director, Boxco Logistics India Pvt Ltd, lauds the efforts of the Ministry of Shipping in launching port-led development projects that will eventually bring down logistics costs across the country.

The $1billion US-based engineering and construction management company, Louis Berger, has been active in India for over 20 years. The New Jersey-based corporation is engaged in a slewof projects, including bridges, tunnels, roads, highways, railways, and transit, aviation and smart cities.

With an outlay of Rs 1,773 for the year 2017û18, the government has set the ball rolling for the port sector. To promote port-led development in India, Rs 600 crore has already been allocated for the Sagarmala Programme.

The importance of quality infrastructure and the development of an economy have an umbilical cord binding them and can never be seen in isolation. Broadly, infrastructure is the network of power, telecom, ports, airports, roads, civil aviation, railways, and transportation in a country and is the lifeline of the economy of a country.

Due to coastal shipping becoming economically viable after demonetisation, automajor Hyundai has decided to increase its monthly shipment through this mode. The Korean major has also said that demonetisation has led to ´less supply of trucks´ and coastal shipping is a ´blessing in disguise´ to meet the orders.

Major Ports in India handled 315.4 MT of cargo during the first six months of FY2016-17 (April-September) and showed a positive growth of 5.1 per cent as compared to the same period last year. The cargo traffic handled by the Major Ports during the same period last year was 299.5 MT. This improvement of performance is the result of many measures initiated by the Ministry of Shipping to improve the performance of the ports.