About Forum of Cargo-Owners and Logistics-Operators (FOCAL) portal
- It is a dedicated portal to connect cargo owners and shippers with real time data on availability of vessels
- Launched by: It was launched by the Inland Waterways Authority of India (IWAI)
- In its role as a facilitator and now aggregator, IWAI, that owns a limited number of vessels itself, has been doing pilot movements to establish technical and commercial viability of Inland Waterways Transport (IWT).
- Designed by: It has been designed and developed by the in-house IT Department and the Traffic Wing of IWAI as part of its preparedness for optimal use of its ongoing capacity development on various National Waterways.
Key features of the portal
- The landmark e-connect measure will enable direct interaction among the vessel operators, shippers and cargo owners as currently, there is no platform to know the availability of vessels in the market.
- FOCAL will facilitate responses from the logistic operators against the requirement raised by cargo owners and vice-versa.
- The users can register on the portal to key in the availability and details of vessels or the available cargo, as the case may be.
- Cargo owners will be able to put details like the origin, destination, type of cargo etc.
Source: PIB
