Kochi: The Cochin Shipyard Ltd (CSL) has bagged a major order for building bulk carriers. Steel cutting work for the first of the six 30,000 DWT bulk carriers, for which orders had been placed by M / S Clipper Group of Denmark, has commenced at the CSL.

Speaking on the occasion, D T Joseph, secretary, ministry of shipping, said, India is not exploiting the opportunities in the shipping and maritime sector. India has tremendous scope for developing its shipping sector, he said. Only 15.7 per cent of Indian exports and imports are being conducted on Indian vessels. Of the around 530 ships in the country, only 11 per cent had been built in Indian yards, he said.

Indian shipyards, he said, are non-productive in comparison to their counterparts abroad,. ''''While a Korean yard takes four months to construct a ship, I am told we take four years. Foreign firms do not place orders in our shipyards due to the delay,'''' Joseph said.

Shipyards and ports in the country should adopt aggressive and innovative marketing strategies to attract orders from abroad, he said and added that the shipping ministry would not distinguish between Government and private-run shipyards in the country.

M K Murthy, chairman and managing director, CSL, said that the shipyard had secured Rs500 crore worth of export ship-building orders in 2003-2004. CSL has also been able to achieve a record ship repair turnover of approximately Rs180 crore.

The contract executed on January 22 between CSL and Clipper, Denmark, was for constructing four vessels. This was later increased to six.

On the occasion, the delivery documents for the 1700 CuM Dredger ''Cauvery'' built by CSL for Chennai Port Trust was handed over by Cmdr M.Jitendran, director, operations, CSL, to V.Chellappan, chief engineer, Chennai Port Trust. The vessel was later flagged off to Chennai by the shipping secretary, who also awarded commendation certificates to the various departments of.CSL.