FCC

Financial Assistance to 18 Ports for Procurement of OSR Equipment

2019-12-03

The government has developed a standard operating procedure for all ports in the country to deal with oil spills and other accidents that can damage the marine ecology surrounding the ports, Minister of State for Shipping (Independent Charge) and Chemicals, Mansukh Laxmanbhai Mandaviya told Rajya Sabha on Monday.

The minister said that the central government had formulated a scheme for assisting major ports and oil handling non-major ports under state maritime boards and governments for combating oil pollution and for mitigation measures. Under the scheme, 10 major ports and 8 non-major ports have been provided financial assistance so far for the procurement of Oil Spill Response (OSR) equipment as per specifications suggested in NOSDCP-2015.

He said that the National Oil Spill Disaster Contingency Plan (NOSDCP) delineates the role and responsibility of various authorities including ports during an oil spill. The annual calendar is published for the conduct of different levels of exercises involving various stakeholders for exercising their capabilities in mitigating the risk of oil spills in their area of jurisdiction. As per NOSDCP, ports are required to be capable of handling the Tier-I level of an oil spill within their jurisdiction.