Together with the pandemic and economic crisis the world has seen an upsurge of pirate activity. From the beginning of the year, the number of attacks on ships has been increasing in Asia and a containership crew has been recently captured in Africa. Is the world prepared for the new pirate crisis?

COVID-19 pandemic has given an impetus to maritime authorities, ports and classification societies for facilitation of projects on digitalization and remote access. Those who had actively invested in such technologies before the pandemic have gained competitive advantages.

The Strategy for the development of Russian seaports in the Caspian Basin as well as road and railway approaches to them till 2030 can be cited - the dynamics of cargo turnover in the ports of the region depends on economic processes in other Caspian countries, including Iran, as well as Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan. In addition, prospects for growth of cargo turnover are associated with the development of trading partnership with India and Gulf countries.

In the beginning of 2020, Russia started enactment of fundamental laws on development of the Arctic zone. What changes are expected? How will the coronavirus and oil crisis affect the Artic development? Aleksandr Krutikov, Deputy Minister for the Development of the Russian Far East and Arctic, covers these issues in his interview with IAA PortNews.

Reconstruction of RF border checkpoint in the port of Rostov-on-Don was announced a decade ago but has not actually begun. State Control Bodies (SCB) are accommodated without any right in the building of Rostov Port JSC. The court has declared it to be illegal. The region hopes this problem will be solved on the federal level as the situation has reached a deadlock.

North-South transport corridor is a window of vast opportunities. In his interview with IAA PortNews, Dmitry Potapenko, President of Afanasy Nikitin Association, tells about the challenges of launching the corridor and the ways to meet them in current conditions.

The fall of oil market has surprisingly made coal a more expensive fuel as compared with oil and LNG. This fossil fuel can thus loose some of its markets as renewable energy is getting cheaper. In this case, investments in non-dedicated terminals can prove to be inefficient.

Hardly had the bunkering market adapted to the new IMO sulphur cap when it was attacked by a ‘black swan’ of coronavirus and a slump of oil prices. In the result, bunkering is less profitable in Russia now than in other countries.

The coronavirus spreading across the planet has lead to en masse cancellation of cruises, sinking of container ports’ throughput and growth of supertanker freight rates due to fall of oil prices. Logistic specialists postpone container shipments with the stagnation expected to continue till mid-summer 2020.

Accelerated development of Russia’s Arctic requires the creation of related stevedoring infrastructure for handling of transit and project cargo. The north-west of the Murmansk Region, namely the Liinakhamary area, is a favorable location for a transshipment facility.