Government cuts container waiting time at ports

JAKARTA (JP): The government decided yesterday to cut the time importers can store their containers free of charge at the city's Tanjung Priok port from six days to three days, effective Aug. 1.

Speaking after reporting to Vice President Try Sutrisno, Minister of Transportation Haryanto Dhanutirto said the time reduction was needed to reduce the port's container pile-up.

Haryanto said he would issue a new ruling on June 16. But the ruling would leave a transition period, until Aug. 1.

The new ruling would also set base rates for container stacking at the port's terminals, the minister said.

Consignments stocked at the port for three days will be free of charge, but from the fourth day until the 10th day, a set daily fee will be charged.

Containers stacked at the port for more than 10 days will be charged twice the normal daily fee.

The new ruling will also require PT Pelindo II, which manages Tanjung Priok port, to bear all transportation costs in case it is obliged to remove containers to depots or storage areas outside the port.

Haryanto yesterday again blamed importers for the container pile-up at the port. Currently, the yard occupancy ratio stood at 63 percent, down from a critical 97 percent in late April, he said.

He said many importers deliberately delayed picking up their containers from Tanjung Priok's container yards for as long as six days because they were only charged a one-day fee.

With a shorter free-of-charge storage period at the port, importers would be forced to remove their goods as soon as possible, Haryanto said.

But importers have been complaining of slow processing of customs documents, claiming they had to spent at least four days with the customs service to clear them.

Customs redtape

Anton J. Supit, chairman of the Indonesian Footwear Association, said no rational industrial company wanted to have their urgently-needed raw materials stay a single hour longer at the port than necessary.

"If we clear our goods only after the sixth day after arrival, it's because of prolonged bureaucratic paperwork, not because we want that," Anton said.

At a meeting between importers and Minister Haryanto on Monday, an importer said paperwork could be completed within four days only if all parties, including banks, the port authority, shipping agents and importers, were connected to the customs' electronic data interchange (EDI).

Currently, most importers and banks are not linked to the EDI system.

Aggrayni G., a director at shoe manufacturer PT Astra Graphia, said at a meeting with Minister of Industry and Trade Tunky Ariwibowo last week, that her company subscribed to the EDI system but still could not complete all the customs paperwork within three days.

Other importers complained that the arbitrary removal of containers to private terminals had complicated the clearance of goods from customs areas, because importers often had difficulty finding their containers in the vast yard.

In addition, the transfer of containers to private depots incurred additional to importers because the private depots charged higher fees, about Rp 500,000 (US$205) per 40-foot container per day.

Economist and trade analyst, I Nyoman Moena, was quoted by Antara as saying that cutting the free-of-charge storage days at the port would create additional problems for importers.

If it was not followed by quicker processing of paperwork by the customs office, it would simply impose big additional costs on importers.

To solve the problem, Moena suggested the customs office combine the abandoned pre-shipment inspection system with the on- arrival inspection system to ensure a smoother flow of goods through the port.

He suggested that strategic industrial imports by state agencies and state-owned firms could be inspected at ports of loading, while raw materials and consumer goods imports could be inspected at points of unloading.

The pre-shipment inspection system had for more than 11 years proved to be an efficient way of ensuring a smooth flow of goods, said Moena.

Indonesia used pre-shipment inspection from mid-1985 to March 31, 1997. (rid)