Dhaka : The first bonded, cross-border, land-air transshipment from Bangla-desh flew out of the Indian airport of Kolkata after Expo Freight Ltd. (EFL) introduced a tailor-made logistics solution to handle such cargo transshipments between the two neighbouring countries.

The EFL offices in Bangladesh and India worked jointly in handling the cargo of apparel.

Bangladeshi trucks carrying cargo weighing 4.1 tonnes transferred the goods to Indian trucks at the Benapole-Petrapole border. From there, via GPS enabled trucks, the cargo moved to the Kolkata airport. Finally, it was air freighted to reach the terminal destination in Europe within the specified time window.

The facilitation of this transshipment is a result that originated from the signing of the BBIN (Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal) agreement in 2016, which attempts to increase co-operation between the countries.

Through this trial initiative, Kolkata turned out to be a strategic and useful transshipment doorway to Bangladesh for inbound and outbound air transportation.

S Senthilnathan, CEO, EFL Group, said, "We are proud to enrich our ties with Bangladesh through this movement and alternative solutions of this nature will enable us to enhance efficiencies of our logistics operations to promote international trade."

EFL is considering this breakthrough to be instrumental in positively impacting business growth beyond borders.