Sri Lanka will soon approach Lloyds Register of London with a request to review its classification of the country as a ‘region with a war’ with ships calling on Colombo having to pay a war risk premium.

"We have had some preliminary discussions with Lloyds but we hope to make an official representation soon. We hope to invite them to Colombo so that they can judge the situation for themselves," said Dr. P. Bandu Wickrama, Chairman, Sri Lanka Ports Authority.

"I will be calling on Lloyds at London soon and I will invite them to Sri Lanka," he told the Island Financial Review.

"We can expect the negotiations to be a success and will expect ship agents and ship owners in Sri Lanka to help us by lobbying with Lloyds," he said.

Industry sources said that Sri Lanka is classified as a ‘region with a war’ by Lloyds Register, which means that vessels calling on Sri Lanka have to pay additional war-risk premiums. Apart from this, when the LTTE attempted to attack the Colombo Port in 2001, Lloyds slapped another ‘travel warning’ which was subsequently removed.

Sources say however, that big shipping lines do not pay additional ‘war-risk premiums when calling on Sri Lanka as they are have enough clout to negotiate with their insurance companies, where the premium is waived off because of the relationship between the shipping line and its insurer.

However, removing Sri Lanka from a ‘region with a war’ classification is expected to attract more shipping lines and their vessels into Colombo.

It’s like a travel advisory. With it you will get fewer travelers, without it, things will be very different.

Total cargo handling at Colombo grew by 9.1 percent to 50.6 million MT in 2008 compared to the 8.6 percent growth in 2007.

Total container handling also recorded an increase of 9.1 percent to 3.7 million TEUs while transshipments increased by 11.5 percent. Thus, the port of Colombo recorded the highest container throughput during the year.

In 2008, the number of vessels calling at the port increased by 2 percent, down from 5.4 percent in 2007.

According to the Central Bank Annual Report, 2009 could be a difficult year.

"The global economic slowdown and the resultant reduction in world trade could have a significant impact on port services this year," it says.