By Skandha Gunasekara The East Terminal of the Colombo Port will begin operations under the Sri Lanka Ports Authority (SLPA) within the next few months, Minister of Ports and Shipping told The Sunday Morning. According to the Minister, shipping traffic at the Colombo Port increased drastically in the last year, causing serious congestion. He also stated that an additional terminal was vital to ease congestion. “I have submitted a cabinet proposal to operationalise the East Terminal of the Colombo Port. There is heavy container ship traffic at the port, and only the terminal operated by the Chinese company, Colombo International Container Terminal, can handle deep water ships. We have had to delay docking of certain ships due to increased congestion. The East Terminal can handle deep water ships and would help lessen the container ship traffic,” the Minister said. He noted that the East Terminal would be operated solely by the Sri Lanka Ports Authority. “There will be no Public-Private Partnership (PPP) in the operations of the East Terminal. It will be fully handled by the SLPA.” Pointing out that the procurement process for the machinery required to operate the terminal would take at least three months to complete, the Minister had proposed that the SLPA temporarily lease the equipment. “I have proposed that we call for international tenders to lease such equipment. This way we can start operations instead of waiting three months for the procurement process to be completed. The East Terminal must begin operations soon as the there is severe congestion at the Port.” Earlier this year, Alphaliner Global Port rankings ranked the Colombo Port as the fastest growing port in the world for the first half of 2018. In container handling, the Port of Colombo recorded a 15.6% growth for the first half of the year. This is the first time in history that the Port of Colombo reached this rank.