State explains cause of recent delays in cargo clearance at Mombasa port

Kenya: The Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure has identified extreme weather conditions in the high seas that were experienced during the months of June and July as one of the reasons for delays in clearing of goods in and out of the port of Mombasa.

According to Transport Principal Secretary Nduva Muli, the delays have also been caused by the upsurge in trans-shipment traffic and ongoing civil works at the yards and construction of new gates and port roads.

The PS, however, noted that average waiting time for ships over the past two years has been less than a day. "Currently, some ships are experiencing delays in excess of three days for reasons explained above. The most affected are container ships," he said in a statement

Mr Muli added that the expected minimum productivity for container ships ranges between 15 to 20 moves per hour depending on the type and size of ship stowage plan, type of crane and other circumstances. "For the past two years, KPA has recorded improved performance in terms of productivity ranging from 19 to 23 moves per hour," he said.

He further explained in the statement that ship performance has largely three components; ship's time in the port, ship working time and ship weather time.

"In the months of June, July and August the ship weather days remained the same while the ship working days increased on account of the prolonged rains that were accompanied by strong winds and poor visibility," said Muli.

"In these circumstances, it became risky to operate ships. It is therefore possible a ship will be in the berth but be non-productive because of bad weather," he added, saying currently, ship turnaround time averages 2.7 days.