FESCO Group has officially announced it plans to take leading positions at Russian market of inter-modal cargo transportation and logistics within three coming years. FESCO’s total investments till 2010 may amount to $1 billion

RF Transport Ministry has decided on how the personnel should be trained for domestic shipping companies. Until recently, educational standards adopted in 2002 allowed graduates of river colleges to get a combined navigator-technician qualification

Total export of oil products via the Russian ports of the Gulf of Finland will make 25 million tons in 2007 against 23 million tons in 2006. This year, the port of St. Petersburg and LUKOIL sea terminal in Vysotsk will almost go halves in total export of oil products via the Gulf of Finland

A berth for transshipment of oil products in the port of St. Petersburg has been out of operation for almost three weeks already. The loss of the stevedoring company exceeds $300 thou. Prohibition on mooring has been issued by the office of the Port Captain in contravention of a corresponding arbitrage ruling. It served private company as a ground for application to the prosecutor’s office to initiate a criminal case against Anatoli Mykharov, acting Captain of the port of St. Petersburg

PortNews IAA quotes the report made by Nikolai Smirnov, president of the Association of Shipping Companies, at the meeting of the Marine Board held March 28, 2007

Sea Port of Saint Petersburg (Morport), the largest stevedoring company in the port of Saint Petersburg, has been suspending implementation of a large-scale investment program for over a year owing to lack of proper regulation in the sphere of property relations with government in terms of lease of sea berths

Bunkering of river fleet is a season-depending sector. Vessels going along the Volga-Baltic Waterway (Volga-Balt) consume large volumes of light fuel from April till November. About 10-15% of total bunker consumed by river fleet falls on dark fuel (MDO, IFO- 30)

The first Russian shipyard to sign an order for construction of bunkering tankers was Nevsky shipbuilding-shiprepair plant LLC (Nevsky Zavod, Leningrad region). Oleg Firsov, Director General of Nevsky Zavod, discloses the details of this unique contract

AXS-Alphaliner has released the results of its latest capacity survey on the Far East-Europe run. There are 57 loops offer a weekly capacity of 321,500 TEU on an annualised basis. This represents a 16.5% increase per annum over the past two years.

Mikhail Romanovski, President of RF Union of Ship Owners (SOROSS), has made a report on revision of port charges at a round table conference arranged by Marine Council under Saint Petersburg Government and Edinaya Rossiya party. PortNews IAA provides some abstracts from the report