Kochi is celebrating the 50th year of the first container ship calling at the port. The first container ship arrived here in November 1973, much earlier than in Mumbai and Chennai ports. The first container was discharged at Kochi from the vessel MV President Tyler.
Since then, container movement through Kochi has undergone many changes, the latest being the establishment of the first transshipment terminal in a Special Economic Zone on Vallarpadam island in February 2011 with DP World as the operator.
Prior to that, a full-fledged container handling operation was launched under the aegis of the erstwhile Cochin Port Trust under the name ‘Rajiv Gandhi Container Terminal’ (RGCT). When the facility was handed over to a private licencee, the RGCT had handled 1.68 lakh TEUs. The throughput at the Vallarpadam terminal last year stood at 6.95 lakh TEUs.
