Barriers to coastal shipping development: An Indian perspective

- Short sea/coastal shipping is a sustainable alternative to road transport.
- Main barriers in India are in legislation, port infrastructure and procedures.
- Cabotage rules should be relaxed to stimulate growth in coastal shipping.
- Ports need to collaborate with multiple stakeholders including Indian customs.

Coastal shipping has been widely recognised as a sustainable and efficient alternative to road transport. However, the barriers encountered in the industry have not been systematically studied in any region. From an Indian perspective, this study aims to prioritise barriers to coastal shipping development for effective policy interventions. It identifies important barriers through a Delphi study and then quantifies their cause-and-effect relationships by the decision making-trial and evaluation laboratory analysis (DEMATEL) technique. It is interesting that the main barriers, those have most impact on coastal shipping development, are not necessarily the ones most widely recognised. The study also uncovers the hidden cause-and-effect relationships between several barriers. Four main barriers are identified: (1) Indian maritime legislation (especially cabotage rules); (2) issues in the infrastructure and procedures at port and port-centric areas; (3) underdevelopment of small ports; (4) lack of a collaborative culture among the various service providers involved in the logistics supply chain. This study finally recommends relaxing cabotage rules to stimulate the inflow of foreign capital to grow coastal shipping, improving the current port system through joint efforts of the ports, Indian customs and government, and fostering supply chain collaboration.