The rail freight transport market between Europe and the Community of Independent States (CSI) will record constant increases until 2020, and under the circumstances, the countries of the two regions must optimise their traffic and legislation in order to be able to stimulate the increase of traffic volumes.
“The railway traffic between EU and the eastern neighbouring states will increase by over 30% until 2020, and for this purpose we must realise better connections and consolidate the cooperation with Russia, one of the great EU business partners. The eastern region is vital as regards the freight transit between EU and China”, declared the EC Vice-President Siim Kallas, commissioner responsible for transport.
O ne of the main objectives is the consolidation of railway traffic legislation, both at national and regional level, since freight transport operators face problems which need regulation. For instance, in order to perform freight transport to CIS, the operators need to be represented within the freight volume coordination commission, because the commission estimates the freight transport volumes at least one year before, and if they are registered within the estimation body, they cannot provide transport services.
Therefore, a problem faced by the private rail freight transport operators in Romania is the limited access to transport relations with the CSI, because of the decisions of the involved authorities. This is related to the exclusion of private operators from the transport volume coordinating commissions with OSJD member states and they are not represented in Romania’s balance payment representative body with OSJD members. “Practically, this problem has two aspects. One refers to the fact that there is a mutual discount system for the wagon detention charges and a single payment balance is held. Private operators are not represented in Romania’s balance payment representative body with OSJD members. The second point refers to the necessity of estimating the volumes of freight carried per annum which will be discussed by the volume coordinating commission. Romania is represented in this commission by national operator CFR Marfă who refuses to represent private railway operators. Therefore, as long as we, the private operators, are not represented, we are not present in the commission or in elaborating the balance sheets for single payments”, declared George Buruiană, President of the Romanian Railway Transport Carriers.
The operators association needs to be represented in this region by the independent body, which can represent operators, with no preferential treatments. “We have requested the authorities that we should be represented independently by the infrastructure manager CFR SA, but it is very difficult to convince them”, stated the president of ATFER.
Therefore, under the circumstances since which CFR SA is the national infrastructure manager and should become the representative of rail freight operators within the coordination commission, the elimination of imposed limitations and the free access to infrastructure would be executed, because CFR SA will be able to develop cooperation with the CSI infrastructure managers for facilitating transport. Demands for freight transport in this region are high and rising and we need to ensure a competitive and performing railway transport delivered by private Romanian operators.
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