MINSK, 2 December (BelTA) – A delegation of Belarusian Railways led by First Deputy Head of the enterprise Igor Shilov is taking part in international events focusing on cooperation in transportation between Belarus, Latvia, and Scandinavia. The event has been organized by Latvian Railways in Sweden, the press service of Belarusian Railways told BelTA.
Belarus is connected by tight economic ties with Baltic and Scandinavian countries. Belarusian companies use railways to export mineral fertilizers, oil products, timber, construction materials, ferrous metals, and other goods to Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia. Belarusian mineral fertilizers, food, peat, ferrous metals, and woodworking products are exported to Sweden, Denmark, Norway, and Finland via Baltic ports.
During a presentation of Belarusian Railways' potential Igor Shilov mentioned several important logistics projects: the trains Belarus-Romania, Containerships Train, and Minsk-Riga. All of them travel exactly on schedule, boast high travel speeds, competitive rates, and fast border-crossing procedures.
The Belarus-Romania container train to transport chipped wood was launched in March 2019 by Belarusian Railways' daughter enterprise Belintertrans – Transport and Logistics Center in association with the railway administrations of Belarus, Ukraine, and Romania as well as the companies Rail Cargo Logistics (Slovenia) and Zahidtransservis (Ukraine).
Another logistics project was launched in July 2019 – Containerships Train that shuttles between Lithuania and Ukraine via Belarus. It was implemented by Belintertrans – Transport and Logistics Center and the railway administrations of Lithuania, Belarus, and Ukraine as well as the companies OOO Containerships and ZAO Intermodal Container Service.
In his speech Igor Shilov drew attention to the most successful and largest joint project – the fast freight train Minsk-Riga-Minsk. It was launched in early 2018. Since then the total time in transit has been reduced from 40 hours to 20 hours taking into account border-crossing procedures at the Belarusian-Latvian border. Over 1,100 trains have been arranged so far.
Belarusian Railways and Latvian Railways are now working on a memorandum that will allow them to team up with Ukrainian Railways to launch the fast freight train Riga-Minsk-Kiev-Odessa. The train will offer reliable transportation between the Baltic Sea and the Black Sea by rail.
Igor Shilov invited Swedish logistics companies to join the project. He underlined that Belarusian Railways is ready to offer competitive rates, fast delivery, transparent schedules, and seamless technologies.
Transportation by rail between Europe and China was mentioned as one of the projects Belarusian Railways is ready to offer today. Over 90% of all the overland freight traffic by rail from China to Europe and back goes via Belarus.
Every day 12-14 container trains cross Belarus as part of the Silk Road project. The trains depart from 60 Chinese cities to deliver goods to 50 cities in 15 European countries. The China-Belarus industrial park Great Stone has a considerable potential for developing transportation between China and Scandinavia and between Belarus and Scandinavia.
