Dhaka, July 31 (IANS) Bangladesh has shelved plans to construct a deep-sea port to make it a shipping gateway for South and Southeast Asia because of high costs and a long gestation period.
Shipping and Communications Adviser Maj Gen (retd.) M.A. Matin said Monday that the proposed deep-sea port would cost 42 billion takas (approx $70 million) and would be completed only by 2055.
“So, the present government does not intend to step into such a gigantic task considering the huge involvement of money,” he was quoted as saying by United News of Bangladesh (UNB).
The caretaker government is instead going in for a cheaper alternative for the present by trying to dredge the Karnaphuli river and improve the functioning of its present port facilities.
It has decided to seek recommendations from Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (Buet) on removing sediments from the river.
The deep-sea port project has been only at a preliminary stage. The committee of advisors of the present government had only last week accepted recommendations of a Japanese firm, Pacific Consultants International (PCI).
Sanodia, an island near Cox’s Bazaar in southeast Bangladesh, has been recommended for the project.
The Khaleda Zia government had initiated the plan in 2005 for building the deep-sea port to ease the pressure on Chittagong Port in handling containers and cargoes.