Inchon Port Authority(IPA) is struggling to achieve the target traffic that was set up early this year.

According to IPA, it has been revealed that container traffic in the first quarter recorded 452,000 TEUs, down 0.7% compared to the same period previous year while bulk traffic was 30.61 million tons, down 2.6% as well.

Some seasonal factors such as dense fog at sea between winter and spring and Chinese Lunar New Year holiday are thought to have influenced on the traffic of Inchon port, however, IPA staff are alert to such an easygoing way of thinking.

Dwelling on a sense of frustration at failing to achieve target traffic of 2 million TEUs last year(1,996,000 TEUs), they are now reestablishing their determination to accomplish 2.12 million TEUs of target. Actually last week IPA's executive team and the staff of main departments analysed the changes of traffic and discussed the countermeasures.

Some rules were made at the meeting that the cause of traffic variation other than factors beyond the scope of IPA's control including exchange rate, recession, government policy and factory relocation etc. should be clearly defined and the counterstrategy has to be made based on that.

It was followed by further requirement that action plans to identify traffic fall and added items and to maximize the rise in traffic should be presented periodically along with concrete target figure.

Some pointed out that industry' complaint about overlooking the significance of bulk cargoes should be distinctly recognized and the efforts to resolve it needs to be made.

Accordingly, IPA is going to set up realistic goals as well as detailed tasks and to carry out constant monitoring and actions by mid May under role sharing and co-operative relationships among major relevant departments centering around logistics planning team(analysis) and marketing team(action).

IPA says major plans raised at the last meeting cover attraction of main shippers and cargoes from the metropolitan area, using advantages of being an import port for consumption goods and typical port for export/import to China and conciliatory approach to bulk cargoes that plans to migrate to other ports etc.