RF Transport Minister Maxim Sokolov sees one of the key problems of Russia’s port infrastructure in the deficit of deepwater ports, especially in the Southern Basin, that could be solved through the development of port Taman.

Far Eastern Shipbuilding and Ship Repair Center (FESRC), which is now outside the United Shipbuilding Corporation (USC), hopes to consolidate all contracts on construction of marine facilities and vessels for offshore projects as the base for establishing a complex to build large capacity vessels. Potential customers, in their turn, are ready for partnership with all shipyards able for executing their orders and also count on state to support construction of vessels in Russia.

Cargo owners and shipping companies raise alarm – if financing of inland water ways is not provided urgently and in full, and implementation of projects on creation of certain hydrosystems is not started, freight transportation by inland water ways may stop and the budget can be short of billions of rubles per year. This will threaten supply of resources to some regions of Russia.

While container flow through Russian terminals falls steeply, foreign ports of the Baltic Sea continue handling almost 25% of containers bound for Russia. The market players blame it primarily on imperfect customs administration in Russia, insufficient free storage time at domestic terminals and high rates of storage services.

In the context of Russia’s urgent need in renovation of merchant fleet and substitution of imports amid sanctions, Russian Government elaborates measures to support domestic shipbuilding including marine engineering and instrumentation technology. Maxim Kochetkov, Director of Shipbuilding Department at Russia’s Ministry of Industry and Trade, tells IAA PortNews about the current status of domestic shipbuilding and the measures intended for its development.

Russia desperately needs to establish a regular and stable transport links with the Kaliningrad region, the Crimea and Sakhalin. For this purpose it is proposed to build new ferries with the transfer of functions of the maritime carrier to BFI LLC (Black Sea Ferry & Investments), a subsidiary of JSC Russian Railways (RZD), working under the terms of charter with its shareholder. This will help form through rates and ensure the profitability of transport, and if necessary to subsidize the transport tariffs.

Global fleet comprising some 1.5 mln crewmembers carries about 90% of all cargoes worldwide. However, IMO says commercial fleet lacks some 40,000 officers. Shortage of personnel and training fleet, necessity to enhance the profession prestige and other issues were discussed at the Admiral Makarov State University of Maritime and Inland Shipping by the heads of Russia’s leading sea and river transport institutions.

Commercial Seaport of Sochi OJSC is set to revive freight-and-passenger service at Sochi (Russia) - Trabzon (Turkey) line. Both the Turkish side and the Russian business partners support the service revival and demonstrate their willingness to proceed to action. However, the project is opposed by Sochi Administration concerned about additional load on city roads.

Domestic shipbuilding has generally settled for assembling of hulls and installation of foreign equipment. RF Government is set to break the vicious circle of commitment to ship ‘insides’ of foreign origin. State incentive mechanisms are under development to encourage construction of vessels at domestic shipyards. However, some of the proposed measures seem to be controversial and the results achieved are often a fiction.

Port sector development in Crimea is hindered by international sanctions as well as high port charges, insufficient competition and low containerization of cargoes. That is the opinion of the Second Crimean Transport Forum participants who met in Alushta last week.