Agri export and refrigerated cargo business has helped Gujarat Pipavav Port report good performance, said its Managing Director Prakash Tulsiani.Speaking to CNBC-TV18's Latha Venkatesh and Ekta Batra, Tulsiani said the global and macro environment have been tough for the business since 2012. He is, however, hopeful that exports will pick up given the demand revival in US & Europe.Gujarat Pipavav's fourth quarter net profit more than doubled to Rs 77 crore during October-December period against Rs 36 crore on a year-on-year basis. The company said the profitability was led by higher container volumes, better realisation, PRCL dividend, impairment write back and lower finance cost.Total income for the period grew 22.2 percent to Rs 145.2 crore.Tulsiani said the forex volatility has been a positive for the company. Gujarat Pipavav's outstanding debt stands at around Rs 300 crore. "We are comfortable with the current debt and equity ratio," added Tulsiani.
Below is the interview of Prakash Tulsiani, MD, Gujarat Pipavav Port with Latha Venkatesh and Ekta Batra etc on CNBC-TV18.
Latha: What all went right? What were the other key growth drivers this quarter?
A: You are right that the global or even the macro environment in India has been a tough one and it has not been only for the last year in 2013, but also the year before that in 2012. In our case because of a very good agricultural exports and because of the refrigerated cargo, we have seen a good growth.
We follow the calendar year. So, compared to 2012, in 2013 we have grown by 16 percent this is on the back of very good agricultural exports, which we have seen through our port specifically cotton and seeds and other agricultural products. So, this has been the main growth area for us.
Latha: So what is the outlook on container and cargo volumes in this Q4 given the fact that there has of course a positive turn in US and European economies?
A: With US and Europe improving we will certainly see lot more exports going out of India and yes, we can see that the growth has started and they are on track whether it is in US or Europe. I think US is doing better than Europe, so let me say when this uptake comes in we will also see exports improving and ports doing better.
Ekta: What about the rail and inland container, deeper volumes? What kind of improvement and momentum are you seeing there?
A: For India it is very important to see that the manufacturing activity is not all along the coast unlike many other countries specifically I am referring to China. India has a lot of hinterland growth also. So, there are facilities, there are lot of production areas up north in India and they need a connectivity, they need to export or import goods and ports are extremely important. For this connectivity rail is extremely important and this is a unique selling proposition at Pipavav.
For Pipavav, if you see we have developed this rail network in the sense of handling efficiency improvements by bringing in special cranes, which can handle trains and these cranes are able to also ensure that we have quick productivity, the cost is low and the quick turnaround of trains.
Furthermore in the year of 2013 somewhere around June-July we had gone in for double-stack train. It is where we can carry two containers on one wagon and this doubles the capacity for us for evacuation. This has been a unique one and great proposition for Gujarat Pipavav because now we can evacuate more containers in a similar train numbers.
In fact if you see in this quarter under review a number of trains have gone down but our volumes have gone up and this is because of double-stack. So this is extremely good for not only the shipping line but also the exporter-importer and also the train operators. So, it is utilising your assets even better.
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