Govt urged to use barges to get essentials from outside Goa

Panaji: The Goa Barge Owners Association on Monday urged government to use their vessels to bring in vegetables and essentials for Goa from the neighbouring states.

“A barge has a capacity to transport 2,000 tonne of food grains from other states and that too at half the cost, which will enable the government to get around the need for operating 200 trucks at a time. It will also help save money,” said former GBOA president Atul Jadhav.

He claimed that approximately 400 drivers and labourers operating 200 trucks are transporting essentials into Goa while on a barge there are only 10 crewmembers.

“As there will be fewer people on barges, there will not be a headache for the concerned departments to test the crewmembers for the COVID-19 pandemic and to track their movement,” Jadhav

explained.

Jadhav has already held discussions with officials of the health department on the matter. He urged the government to consider their request for pressing the barges into service for ferrying essentials from

other states.

Earlier in the day, GBOA members met Captain of Ports James Braganza seeking his intervention to help them get the necessary permission from the government to bring back barges along with all its crewmembers from

different ports.

The GBOA said that they have 15 barges anchored outside the state having nine to ten crewmembers on each vessel.