Blue Bird offers container handling

Blue Bird offers container handling

JAKARTA (JP): The Blue Bird group, a private transportation company, will establish a US$15-million container handling facility here in cooperation with a domestic freight forwarding firm and a Malaysian transportation company.

Under an agreement signed here yesterday, the three parties, Blue Bird, PT Ritra Cargo Indonesia and Kontena Nasional of Malaysia, have agreed to set up the facility under their joint venture company called PT Ritra Kontena Freight Center.

"The company, offering a container yard and warehouse, is equally owned by the three parties. The project, which is under construction on a six-hectare plot, will be completed in June," Ritra's president Anthon Riyanto said.

He said that the facility, located about 2.5 kilometers from the Tanjung Priok Port in North Jakarta, will also be equipped with cold storage.

He said the demand for container yards will increase in the coming years as reflected in the steadily rising volume of container freight handled at Tanjung Priok.

Official data show that container traffic through Tanjung Priok has increased by 25 percent per year. In 1994, the total volume of container freight handled at the port reached 1.27 million twenty-feet equivalent units (TEUs), which rose to 1.36 million TEUs in 1995. The figure is projected to reach 2.4 million TEUS in the year of 2000.

Meanwhile, Blue Bird's president Mrs. Djokosoetono said that the new company is the group's eighth subsidiary.

"This is the expansion of PT Iron Bird, one Blue Bird's subsidiaries, which runs a container transportation service," she said.

Blue Bird is one of the country's leading transportation firms. The group, which won an Asian Management Award last year for its operations management, operates more than 4,000 vehicles including taxicabs and buses.

Kontena's chief executive, Mohd Mokhtar Abu Bakar, said yesterday that his company, which was established 25 years ago, is a pioneer and leader in the container haulage business in Malaysia.

"Today Kontena is a leading provider of integrated transport in Malaysia with a service base that includes international freight forwarding, depot services and warehousing," he said, adding that Kontena will provide management expertise in the joint venture company.

Kontena has also a freight forwarding subsidiary in London and will set up a port management firm in Vietnam, he said. (icn)