Container Deposit: Firm Seeks Shippers Council's Consent For Alternative For Shippers

...As Shipping Companies Stop Manual Submission Of Shipping Manifest

Harboursandport.com: Lagos - As a means of solving the vexed issue of container deposit in the shipping subsector of the maritime industry, a firm has approached the Nigerian Shippers Council, NSC with an alternative to solving the lingering differences between Shippers and shipping companies.

This is even as the NSC has disclosed that shipping companies are required to send their shipping manifest electronically as against the submission of several bulky copies manually to the Nigerian Ports Authority, NPA, the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency, NIMASA, and Nigeria Customs Service, NCS.

Shippers have been crying out over the difficulty to get back their compulsory deposit of N200,000 for 20-foot and N40,000 for 40-foot containers which were supposed to.be refunded when the Shippers return shipping companies' empty containers.

Shippers are complaining the shipping companies hold on to billions of naira annually from such un-refunded revenue.

Executive Secretary/Chief Executive Officer of Shippers Council, Emmanuel Jime who disclosed in Lagos, said that the Council is considering two options as solutions to the logjam between the shippers and shipping companies.

Jime said while the discussion with the National Insurance Commission, NIS to underwrite the collection and return of containers, another firm has approached them with a proposal seeking an alternative solution to the issue.

Jime said that the Council is considering both and will decide on the best option that will be beneficial to shippers.

He however noted shipping companies lease these expensive containers from third parties and are made to pay back when the containers are not returned.

According to him, "Now as recent as last year, the 20-foot container was going for over 3000 dollars while a 40-foot container went for over 4000 dollars. Of course, we have other types of containers. There are the refrigerated containers and then of course insulated containers as well. These are specialized containers that cost even a lot more. 

"Secondly, you need to also appreciate that the shipping industry and the shipping companies sometimes actually lease this container. 

"That is the connection that you must draw to appreciate why container deposit has become such an important requirement in the shipping industry. 

"I am not saying this because I want to speak on the side of the shipping companies, I only say this because as an economic regulator; we are duty bound to be unbiased in the way that we analyse the situation so that people will appreciate it. 

"Our job is to be a protector of all stakeholders in the industry by ensuring there is fairness in the way the business is conducted. 

"Now having appreciated point from the shipping company and the terminal operators' perspective, there is also the other side of the argument where when containers are returned in most cases these deposits are not accessed. And so Nigerian shippers are also suffering losses. 

"And that is where we now went into a discussion with the National Insurance Commission, NICOM. And then a committee was set up where in the course of the work of the committee, some suggestions were made as to how a container insurance regime could be put in place. 

"I want to say that we are still in the process of discussions. You know these things, beautiful ideas as they may be, you are not able to simply deploy them immediately because you are Shippers Council or Economic Regulator. You have got to have the buy-in of stakeholders in the industry. 

"And do not forget we are also supervised by a ministry. So, in the end, some of the decisions as much as we want to rush and put them to the advantage of the economy, we are constrained to follow through with what I would like to describe as due process and so that is what is constraining its deployment. 

"By the way, as we are proceeding and promoting the introduction of this container insurance deposit, someone else now also introduced another platform called the container guarantee which in a sense is supposed to function slightly differently from a container Deposit Insurance. 

"These are two platforms that are in the market place we are all looking at both of them to see which one of them best serves the interests of the industry. But at the moment, those discussions are ongoing. We haven’t quite concluded yet."

On the submission of shipping manifest electronically he said, "The Shippers Council is in the forefront pushing for automation of processes and procedures in the industry and I am happy to say that from all the efforts, today for instance, because of our insistence the submission of manifest by shipping companies must be done electronically, it’s no longer being done manually. 

"So that is already a movement in the right direction. The Customs to which the manifest is actually meant to be sent are aware that you can no longer be insisting that you should get the manifest submitted to you manually today. It’s part of the advocacy work of the Shippers Council, NIMASA, Customs and I believe the NPA as well.  Manifest of vessels today is no longer manual," he noted.