Transporters risk losing billions?

With another Covid-19 spike in India and the subsequent efforts to arrest it, transporters are once again risking losing billion dollars, claim sources. They mention that regional lockdowns, curfews and other restrictions could lead to a loss of revenue of roughly Rs.17,800 crore per month. They add that the manufacturing sector has already started showing signs of a slowdown with raw material in short supply. Risking steep price escalation among other effects, the slowdown in manufacturing sector is starting to replicate in other sectors too.

This in-turn has started to affect load availability for transporters. Transporters therefore, say sources, are worried about freight rates climbing down further in addition to a fall in utilisation levels. Carrying goods worth USD 150 billion a year, which accounts to about USD12 billion per month, the Indian road transport sector, sources explain, is already starting to lose whatever momentum it had gathered in the last few months. If this could translate into a worry for financiers, the supply chain across the country has already begun to slowdown.

A minimum impact of 20 per cent on load carriage is expected for April 2021, and would amount to an erosion of couple of billion dollars in revenue for the logistics sector.