”In the last 10 – 20 years, in Romania, we could have expected a growth of the modal shift of freight transport from road to rail but the market share of the rail freight transport is decreasing, although the regulations in this respect are implemented”, Libor Lochman, Executive Director – CER, said at the Railway PRO Investment Summit – ”Railway business opportunities in the single European transport market”, organised at Bucharest, in October, by Club Feroviar and Railway PRO, with the support of the Romanian Railway Industry Association (AIF).
”But this is no surprise as no major investments in the rail infrastructure occurred and the road transport offers an alternative which freight forwarders can choose. The figures showing the decreasing of the rail freight market share are alarming indeed”, Libor Lochman added.
In the recent years, a larger amount of the State budget funds in Romania was allocated to the road transport sector. We can take a look at the figures in the Romanian General Master Plan for Transport and they show us that the trend for the railway transport sector is not very positive.
CER believes that investments should be accelerated as rail investments bring positive effects to the economy at large.
It is the sector’s generally shared hope that after the achievement of this most important of milestones, all players will be able to adapt to the new legislative framework, to count on its stability and therefore build long-term investment and business strategies.
The CER representative afterwards highlighted some of the policy measures to increase the competitiveness of the railway transport.
”If do not have a good rail infrastructure you will not be competitive and you could suffer from loses. Romania and Romanian companies must have their voice heard in Brussels! We can only move if we have a good national strategy which we could bring in front of the European Institutions”, the CER Executive Director concluded.
by Elena Ilie
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