In January-June 2019, the transport and forwarding company Lemtrans transported 24.85 million tonnes of various types of freight, which is 3.94% down on the same period of 2018.
In the six months of 2019, coal and iron ore accounted for the bulk of loading, totalling 10.44 million tonnes (9.93 million tonnes in January-June 2018) and 8.15 million tonnes (8.68 million tonnes in January-June 2018), respectively, the company’s press service said.
Volumes of transportation of ferrous metals in the first half amounted to 3.83 million tonnes (3.62 million tonnes in January-June 2018), shipments of fluxing materials totaled 1.12 million tonnes (1.60 million tonnes in January-June 2018), and those of coke 0.99 million tonnes (1.54 million tonnes in January-June 2018).
The company notes that the observed decline is due primarily to an increase in the turn-around of railway cars and a fall in the average speed of trains (Lemtrans’s turn-around period in the first half of 2018 was 7.8 days, it grew to 8.9 days in the first six months of 2019, which is an increase by 1.1 days, or 14%).
“The surplus of the railway car fleet, associated with excessive purchases of cars by market participants in 2018-2019, which were related to problems with railway equipment, is coupled with the lack of locomotives. In general, the approach to solving problems should be comprehensive. And the first step is the adoption of a new law on railway transport,” the press service quoted Lemtrans CEO Volodymyr Mezentsev as saying.
The SCM Group owns 100% of Lemtrans’s charter capital.
