Beirut explosion sends trade shockwaves to Kochi

KOCHI: The explosion at the port city of Beirut, the capital of Lebanon, will have a business impact, on the trade through Cochin Port. According to the import-export data accessed by TOI, during the last 14 months, some of the leading Kerala companies, right from Kannur to Thiruvananthapuram had been exporting their products to Lebanon through Beirut Port.

On Wednesday, the Beirut City was rocked by a severe blast believed to be originated from a storage house at its port for ammonium nitrate, a chemical used by both fertiliser and explosives industries.

The products that Kerala exported to the Levantine country is a true representation of the state’s strength in traditional agricultural commodities – it included spices, oleoresins, frozen marine food, tea, coffee, coconut, rubber mats and coir products. Of the total 69 containers sent to Beirut, 22 carried coir products.

“Beirut is a relatively small trade destination for us and whatever being exported to the port essentially caters to the Lebanese market,” said M Krishna Kumar, president, Cochin Steamer Agents’ Association.

Geographically, the companies that had trade with Lebanon came mainly from Alappuzha district - the companies had either headquarters or manufacturing/processing plants there. They include Abad Fisheries, ABM Marine Products and Mangala Marine Exim which deals in frozen seafood. On the other hand, Alleppey Co Ltd, Comet Exports India , Fibre World, Floor Gardens, Golden Coir Tufts, Pobji Emporium, United Coir Factories, William Goodacre and Sons India Ltd and Mats Four sent coir mats through Cochin Port. Coir Mates and Pobji Emporium, again from Alappuzha, exported coir geo fabric to Beirut. Sijo Enterprises from Alappuzha sent rubber mats to the blast-affected port during the last year. While VKL Seasonings was another Alappuzha-based firm that exported spices, Mechanical Assembly Systems from Cherthala exported a plant for manufacturing egg trays from paper pulp.

Kera Fiber Tex International from Kinfra Park, Kakkanad and Dynamo Techno Medicals, Aluva are two companies from Kochi that exported coir mats and orthopaedic appliances to Beirute.

Firms from other parts of Kerala also exported to Lebanon. Eastern Condiments from Adimaly had exported a container of curry powder and Sabith AE exported five containers of coconuts to the Levantine country. Terumo Penpol from Thiruvananthapuram exported blood bags and Western India Plywoods from Kannur exported plywoods. Thrissur-based Kadco Systems also had business with Beirut. Apollo Tyres which got manufacturing plants in Kalamassery and Perambra in Thrissur district exported tyres Lebanon.

Companies from other states also used Cochin Port to trade with Lebanon. While Kolkata-based Chaizup Beverages and Coimbatore based Crystal Tea exported tea, Mumbai-based Omshree International and Coorg-based SLN Coffee exported coffee.

There are few other Coimbatore-based companies that had used Cochin Port to trade with the Levant region and they include ATS Elgi hydraulic fittings, Jayachandran Industries, Jayachandran Alloys.

However, the imports from Beirut to Cochin Port was very negligible – during the last one year, there were only two instances of imports, both by Lulu Shopping Mall of bakery equipment and the latest shipment reached Kochi towards the end of March, this year.