Kenya Ports Authority (KPA) Managing Director Gichiri Ndua (left)
addressing the members of East African Legislative Assembly (EALA) at
the KPA board room in Mombasa in this photo taken on 20th February 2014.
Mr Ndua assured the legislators that operations at the port of Mombasa
had improved doubled resulting to reduced cargo clearance durations.
The port of Mombasa will reduce the period which importers and
exporters store their merchandise at the port for free on improved cargo
clearance.
The Kenya Ports Authority Managing Director
Mr Gichiri Ndua announced the move saying saying storage time will drop
from 9 to 5 having dropped from 15 earlier.
KPA said the 24 hour management system has also helped to improve efficiency.
“Due
to successive operational improvement, efficiency and facilitation at
the port of Mombasa, we have been able to reduce the free cargo storage
time within the port from 15 days earlier to nine and now we are
considering reducing it further to five," Mr Ndua said adding that there
are plans to reduce this days to 3.
The MD said time
taken to transport goods from the port to Malaba border had also
tremendously reduced from nine days to an average of 4.8 days.
Mr
Ndua was addressing members of the east African Legislative Assembly
(EALA) who were touring the facility. He challenged east African member
states to take advantage of the improved efficiency to export more goods
through the port.
“At the moment, it is sad that 85
per cent of all cargo through Mombasa port is imports while only 15 per
cent is exports. Out of the total imports, 63 per cent is Kenyan
designed cargo,” he said.
Mr Ndua hailed the
commissioning of the Standard Gauge Railway by President Uhuru Kenyatta
in August 2013 saying it will revolutionize trade in the region.
He urged member states to pay their taxes promptly to enable the port meet its obligations to serve its clients better.
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