The concession agreement for the terminal was signed between Deendayal Port Trust and J M Baxi Group on 29th February 2016, for the Development, Operation and Maintenance of Container Terminal at Berth Nos. 11 and 12 at Kandla Port on PPP Mode. The physical site was handed over to J M Baxi Group on 24th September 2016 and the site was ready by January 2017. On the very same month on 28th of January 2017, KICT handled its first vessel MV. Gibe 050WB of Ethiopian shipping Line.
Kandla International Container Terminal (KICT) is the closest terminal to the western and the northern hinterlands of the country due to its unique positioning on Kandla Creek in the Gulf of Kachchh. With this there is direct saving in first leg road bridging for the transporters which is reduced by 75 kms, roundtrip of 150 kms thereby immensely benefitting the Tiles Ceramic & Sanitary Ware Shippers from Morbi, Scrap consignees who are located in areas near to Kandla- Gandhidham complex, Imported Timber Conversion Zones in Meghpar, Commodities destined to/ originating from Kandla Special Economic Zone and other industrial clusters located in Gujarat.
Moreover Kandla has 15 million sq.ft of cost effective warehousing facility in Gandhidham complex thereby immensely benefiting the rice shippers from northern parts of the country who does factory stuffing locally. The upcoming project of SIPC Kandla, with special focus on engineering goods, edible oil, furniture & Salt would also immensely benefit from KICT.
From having a monthly throughput of 166 TEUs in January 2017 & 1536 TEUs in February 2017, the terminal reached 41,719 TEUs of monthly throughput on July 2019, thus reaching 83% of the installed capacity of the terminal. In the year 2017 KICT handled 75,123 TEUs which increased to 2,07,619 TEUs thus registering a growth of 176%. Whereas in the year 2019, the terminal is comfortably placed to register more than 90% of growth in volumes.
