PM opens Payra seaport

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina yesterday inaugurated operations of Bangladesh’s third seaport at Kalapara of Patuakhali, for now in limited scale. Payra’s inauguration began with the unloading of goods from a commercial ship, “MV Fortune Bird,” at Ramnabad channel. The ship reached the outer anchorage from China with 53,000 tonnes of stones meant for the Padma Bridge. The premier launched the new seaport along with four other development projects, including the country’s first eight-lane highway, through a video conference from her official residence Ganabhaban. Shipping Minister Shajahan Khan, acting head of Payra seaport Captain Md Saidur Rahman, Chief Whip ASM Firoz, Mahbubur Rahman Talukder MP and Navy chief Admiral Nizam Uddin were present among others at the launching ceremony on the seaport premises. Hasina laid the foundation stone of the seaport on November 19, 2013. The seaport will provide limited services until 2018 and it is expected to become fully functional in 2013. For now, the services will be limited to unloading cargo at the outer anchorage through lighterage vessels. “The southern part of the country will see rapid economic growth once the port becomes fully operational,” the premier said. “The seaport has already been connected to Dhaka by road, and in future, a rail link will established through the Padma Bridge. Moreover, an airport, a 200MW power plant and an exclusive economic zone will also to be established in the port area by 2023,” she added. Later it would be turned into a deep seaport, Hasina said. The port, now being developed on 2,428 hectares (6,000 acres) of land, will also help establish new industries, particularly export processing and shipbuilding sectors, and generate employment. In his speech, Minister Shajahan said that the country needed a new seaport after Chittagong and Mongla for facilitating the growing export-import. “We have taken short-, mid- and long-term plans to develop a state-of-the-art seaport. As part of the short-term plan, we are set to operate the port activities by offloading cargoes from mother ships at the outer anchorage and transport the goods to hinterlands through river routes,” he added. By 2018, the port would get at least one multi-purpose and one bulk terminal where deep draught vessels can berth safely, and under the long-term plan, the port would be fully operational by 2023 with a 16-metre channel and a 10km container terminal.” By this tine, the minister said: “We will be able to establish EPZ, airport, port city, dockyard and ecotourism site centring the Payra seaport. These initiatives will entirely change the scenario of this coastal area.”