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  • 2007 March 5

    Dmitri Atlashkin: North-West Gosmorrechnadzor to be setup by April 16

    Rostransnadzor (Russian Federal Service for Supervision of Transport) continues implementation of administrative legal reform investing its regional subdivisions with new sea supervision functions. By April 16, 2007, North-West Gosmorrechnadzor (North-West Basin Administration of State Service for Supervision of Inland Water Transport) will be set up in Saint Petersburg. This Service will integrate North-West and White Sea - and - Onega Lake Basin Administrations for State Supervision of Inland Water Transport (IWT). Dmitri Atlashkin, head of North-West Gosmorrechnadzor and chief state inspector of Gosmorrechnadzor, tells PortNews IAA about tasks and objectives of the new structure.

    - Dmitri Yuryevich, could you, please tell how far the formation of a new subdivision of Gosmorrechnadzor is from finalization?

    - The administrative legal reform implies transition of sea supervision functions from Federal Agency of Sea and River Transport to Rostransnadzor and its regional administrations. For this purpose Igor Levitin, RF Transport Minister, ordered to form new administrations of sea supervision. Besides, IWT supervision administrations of estuary ports are invested with supervision of sea transport as well. At the Baltic basin, transition of supervision functions to Rostransnadzor will be arranged after North-West Gosmorrechnadzor (NWG) will be set up in Saint Petersburg through integration of North-West and White Sea - and - Onega Lake Basin Administrations for State Supervision of IWT. New administration is to be registered with tax authorities by April 16. Then the staff of our administration will transfer to new organization, while White Sea - and - Onega Lake Basin Administration will be transformed into two linear departments. All in all we’ll have 10 linear departments including 9 river ones and 1 sea department.

    Our functions include control and supervision of IWT as well as sea supervision. The area of responsibility of NWG stretches from Cherepovets to Saint Petersburg and Bolomorsk (Karelia). The Sea Department, which is to be left in Saint Petersburg, will supervise operation of ports and sea transportation within Russian territorial waters of the Baltic Sea.

    I would like to underline that according to the Provision on Gosmorrechnadzor, we are not to perform control functions at sea since it is quite a troublesome and costly work, which cannot be done by our administration because of specific distribution of budget resources. Besides, there is a problem with the staff. The level of wages of Rostransnadzor is quite different from that of Rosmorrechflot and we cannot attract qualified specialists. Thus, control functions are still to be performed by the ports’ captain services: management of port infrastructure and arrangement of navigation. We expect that by the middle of 2007 the rules for supervision are to be developed and approved by Rostransnadzor and Rosmorrechflot.

    - What services are to perform supervision in other ports of the North-West region except those of Saint Petersburg and Kaliningrad?

    - The ports of Murmansk and Arkhangelsk are under jurisdiction of the North Administration of Gosmorrechnadzor, which is to be integrated with Pechora Basin Administration for IWT State Supervision. Thus, the North Administration is to include to large navigable rivers: Pechora and Northern Dvina. The same administration is to perform supervision in the White and Barents Seas.

    - What are territorial and numeral changes North-West Administration of Rostransnadzor is to face?

    - As of today, North-West Administration of Rostransnadzor comprises four management departments, seven linear departments, head of administration and his two deputies. Ivan Ponusenko, acting first deputy, is a head of the department for navigation supervision. Besides, there is a department of fire inspection, the department of registration and licensing, personnel department and financial department. Reorganization implies dividing of the department of registration and licensing into two independent structures. Our authorized staff size numbers 25 persons while as of today, only 22 persons work – part of positions is vacant. Transfer of sea supervision functions to our authorities is to enlarge our staff. It is to consist of 45 persons and inspectors in 10 linear departments. Total number is to make 110 persons.

    Until recently North-West Administration occupied three different places in Saint Petersburg: Remeslennaya str. 17; Bolshaya Morskaya str. 37 and Mezhevoi canal 2. Today all three departments are places in the building of Saint Petersburg harbor station. I hope it will make our structures more operative as earlier it was quite difficult to achieve regular information and the administration was difficult to manage.

    - Does the budget of new Gosmorrechnadzor administration imply increase of staff and maintenance of equipment?

    - Our budget for 2007 totals RUR 24 million. In 2006, it was much lower – RUR 17 million. However this amount is still not enough for normal operation of the administration. Financial problems are partially covered by enthusiasm. We have to buy part of services from organizations subject to our supervision, which is not correct if we speak about operation required by the state.

    Patrol fleet alone consists of 10 boats. The youngest boat is 26 years old. The oldest is 58 years old. All our boats are fitted with engines characterized by extremely short service life. Routine maintenance of one boat alone (without docking) requires RUR 200-300 thou annually. The crews receive very low wages.

    However, we try to solve our problems. Today our staff does not include the position of the fleet technical manager. Since we are not able to carry out technical supervision of the boats we may charge someone else with this task. So we announce a competition for purchase of technical management services for this year. The payment for such a service is to be transferred from other items of our budget. I hope that operation of patrol fleet will take a turn for the better in 2007.

    - Will transfer of sea supervision functions to the North-West Administration entail transfer of licensing certain activities of sea transport to Saint Petersburg?

    - Licensing at sea and IWT is the competence of the Administration of Sea and River Supervision of FATS (Federal Agency for Transport Supervision) in Moscow. We perform only pre-licensing inspection. The activities of licensees are checked once in two years. All the documents are sent to Moscow where the register of licenses is being kept. Since the number of licensed river organizations is quite high, Rostransnadzor decided to delegate the function of IWT licensing to territorial subdivisions. Thus, we are to keep the register of river companies with regular coordination with that of Moscow. Marine shipping and stevedoring companies will continue to be licensed in Moscow. Registration of sea vessels is to be done in seaports as earlier, while we are to supervise the process.

    - New procedure of licensing introduced last year resulted in necessity to replace licenses for certain activities with new ones. In particular, the companies working with hazardous cargo require different licenses for transportation and for handling operations with such type of cargo. How are you to control the process of licenses replacement?

    - Within the framework of our preventive control measures to be taken before summer navigation we are going to check operationability of all vessels returning to navigation after winter season. We are to check technical state of the vessels after repair, state of life-saving equipment and shipboard damage control facilities, general order at vessels as well as availability of all documents required by IWT Code including necessary licenses.

    As soon as our organization is empowered to carry out sea supervision we start controlling availability of all necessary licenses if a company is engaged in handling of hazardous cargo in the port. Special attention is to be given to bunker suppliers and barging companies. I think, we’ll have to approve their monthly list of places to be used for oil products transshipment within the port’s harbor waters as well as the list of vessels deployed for transportation of bunker fuel. All regional bunkering companies should take care about licensing before we finalize reorganization of our administration.

    Nadezhda Malysheva

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