“THE VOLUMES are steadily growing,” says Martin Keck, managing director of independent groupage operator CFR Freight, when asked about trade with India. The growth, he says, is more controlled than the Chinese market has ever been, “which is in some ways a good thing because the Indian infrastructure in terms of rail, road and ports is not as good as China’s. “There are regular port congestion problems in Nhava Sheva and cargo gets rolled over due to shipping lines omitting calls or having their berthing times heavily delayed.” CFR Freight has been successfully operating on this trade lane for many years and business is continuously strengthening, says Keck. “We are running direct import services from Nhava Sheva, Delhi and Chennai and can serve the entire country via those hubs or via Singapore if the origin port is not close to these locations, such as Calcutta.” “Our partners in India, like us, are members of the World Wide Alliance and we anticipate electronic data interchange with them in less than six months,” he concludes.
