LLC Vostochnaya Stevedoring Company (“VSC”, a Global Ports group company) and PAO TransContainer (“TransContainer”, a Delo Group company) have launched regular weekly container train shipments from Nakhodka Vostochnaya station bound for Malaszevicze station in Poland via Brest (Belarus), Global Ports says in a press release. This partnership delivers VSC’s high quality secure terminal service and efficient handling of containers and train formation combined with TransContainer’s high speed rail transportation using owned flat cars.
Shipments commenced via the Nakhodka-Brest-Malaszevicze route in January 2020, with a total of 12 trains having been shipped in the first six months of the year. The first regular container train under the new weekly schedule was shipped on 2 September: 93 TEUs of goods originating in the Asia Pacific region, including temperature-sensitive goods, were shipped via the Russian Far East to Europe.
The new service is designed for goods requiring minimum delivery times that arrive at the terminal by regular sea container shipping lines. The next trains this month are scheduled to be shipped from VSC on 8, 15, 22 and 29 September with maximum travel time by rail of 12 days.
“Switching to a weekly schedule makes the service more convenient and is in line with the needs of our customers seeking fast and reliable transportation options. Given that the route highlights the attraction of using the Trans-Siberian Railroad via Far East cargo flows for customers from the Asia Pacific region that traditionally go via the Suez Canal, this railway transit route is among those subsidised by the Russian Government, which makes it substantially more cost competitive”, noted VSC’s Managing Director Alexey Pavlenko.
The service will be in addition to the far-reaching and efficient network of domestic and transit routes of regular container trains formed by VSC and shipped from Nakhodka Vostochnaya station. Currently VSC ships domestic services bound for the Moscow Railways (Kupavna, Tuchkovo, Vorsino, Elektrougli), Oktyabrskaya Railways (Khovrino station in Moscow and Avtovo and Novy Port stations in Saint Petersburg), Novosibirsk Railways (Kleschikha), Krasnoyarsk (Bazaikha) and Sverdlovsk Railways (Yekaterinburg Freight Station).
In August, the Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin signed an order to subsidise transit rail transportation of containers across Russia. The level of compensation will range from RUB 25,000 – 77,000 per container, depending upon its type and transit destination. This measure will allow VSC to offer competitive prices to international customers and applies to transit routes connecting port stations in the Pacific Ocean basin with the Baltic Sea, the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov, and crossing points on the border with Finland, Belarus, Poland and Azerbaijan.