The Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust and the Venice Port Authority on Monday signed an agreement to enhance cooperation between the two in the areas of port operations, port management and hinterland connections.

The Jawaharlal Nehru port was represented by its Chairman, Mr L. Radhakrishnan, while the Italian port was represented by Captain Antonio Revedin, Senior Manager (on behalf of the Chairman).

The agreement was signed in the presence of the Union Shipping Minister, Mr G.K. Vasan.

The port trust handles nearly 55 per cent of domestic container trade volume of 4.5 million TEUs ( 20-foot equivalent units), the port or Venice caters to the Italy and north Adriatic ports as a nodal port.

Speaking on the occasion, Mr Radhakrishnan said there will also be cooperation between the two ports in the areas of container handling, cruise shipping and staff training.

With the Venice port, annually handling nearly two million passengers, its expertise in cruise shipping will come handy for Indian ports such as the JNPT, Chennai, Mormugao and Chennai that want to tap this growing traffic.

Captain Revedin said the Venice port has founded the Northern Adriatic Ports Association jointly with Trieste, Ravenna, Koper and Rijeka.

Multi-port gateway

This has created a multi-port gateway to attract maritime traffic flows from Asia to reduce the transit time between European ports and Asian countries.

These ports are already connected to India with the introduction of a weekly container service to Indian ports from September.

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