Category: Shipping and Transport

Sept 22, 2011 (LBO) – A Sino-Lanka consortium that is to build a container terminal in Colombo’s new deep-water South Port has signed a deal with Sri Lanka’s investment promotion agency entitling it for tax breaks. Building of the 500 million US dollar terminal by the consortium consisting of China Merchants Holdings, Sri Lanka’s Aitken […]

Sept 21, 2011 (LBO) – Container cargo volumes at Sri Lanka’s Colombo port fell in July although still higher so far this year compared with the same period in 2010, with a noticeable downturn in transhipment traffic. The total number of containers fell 2. 6 percent in July 2011 to 354,054 TEUs (twenty-foot foot equivalent […]

Sept 21, 2011 (LBO) – The Sri Lankan agency for South Korea’s KIA Motors is to invest about a billion rupees in the next three years to expand its service facilities amid a surge in sales of sports utility vehicles. Imports of motor vehicles into the island surged after the government slashed import duties, some […]

September 17, 2011 (AFP) – At least three people including a Korean national were killed and about 25 injured near the Sri Lankan capital when a passenger train crashed into the back of another train, police said. Railway workers were still searching for passengers who might be trapped in the wreckage after the accident, which […]

Sept 09, 2011 (LBO) – Cleveland Bridge UK has signed a 56 million US dollar contact with Sri Lanka’s Ministry of Economic Development to provide up to 210 bridges in rural locations island-wide including in the former north-east war zone. The project will be backed by the UK government’s Export Credit Guarantee Department (ECGD), the […]

Sep 05, 2011 (LBO) – The long-delayed opening of Sri Lanka’s first expressway will be delayed further although construction of the road is over because toll booths and fuel stations are still being built, an official said. The opening of the first section of the southern expressway that was to have been in September has […]

Sep 02, 2011 (LBO) – The state-run Sri Lanka Ports Authority (SLPA) is to provide medical insurance for its employees with the cost borne by the authority which is hugely overstaffed and lost money last year. The SLPA has signed a deal with the National Insurance Trust Fund (NITF) to provide a “comprehensive Medical Insurance […]

Aug 31, 2011 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s Colombo Dockyard said it has won an order to build two passenger ferries for India’s Laskshadweep island administration, on the wake of an earlier delivery to the same customer. The contract comes a year after delivery of two passenger vessels, Arabian Sea and Lakshadweep Sea, for the Administration […]

Aug 31, 2011 (LBO) – New freight forwarding businesses in east Asia helped improve sales and profits for Sri Lanka’s Expolanka Holdings, which aims to further expand overseas and penetrate emerging markets. The group is looking at expanding by increasing its overseas stations and penetrating developing markets and also buying small and medium-sized freight companies […]

Aug 30, 2011 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s Mercantile Shipping Company is renegotiating vessel hire fees and trying a profit-share deal after slipping into the red last year when it was forced to reduce charter rates. But the company also managed to reduce loan repayments, has stable cash flows and anticipates a market recovery, chairman A […]

Aug 25, 2011 (LBO) – Bunkering at Hambantota port in Sri Lanka’s South is to start next month after spending 40 million dollars to demolish a rock blocking the entrance, a media report said. “This rock was identified before we started the port construction,” Sri Lanka Ports Authority Chairman Priyath Wickrama was quoted as saying […]

Aug 25, 2011 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s Hambantota port needs extra loans of 147.9 million dollars to cover equipment including cranes, cost escalations in building the port, and digging the basin and entrance channel, the island’s state-run ports agency said. Responding to media reports and critics, Sri Lanka Ports Authority said the port in the […]