Rail freight traffic between Ukraine and EU runs despite challenges
In spite of Russia’s massive military attack on various parts of Ukraine, the rail freight traffic between the country and the European Union is still running. One of the pieces of evidence is the rail shipments of pellets.
After blocking the Ukrainian ports on the Black Sea by the Russian Navy, the shippers have faced some logistics issues in delivering their freight to the customers. Therefore, some companies are redirecting the shipments from sea to rail. Ferrexpo, the Switzerland-based company that owns and operates three mining plants in the Poltava region of Ukraine, near the city of Horishni Plavni, is among them.
“The situation in Ukraine remains complex and changeable. The Group is aware of reports of the Ukrainian railway network providing limited capacity to its freight customers, and the Group can confirm that it has dispatched a proportion of its production to the western border of Ukraine to customers in Europe,” Ferrexpo states. Meanwhile, the mining company notes that there are some challenges related to the ongoing availability of railing capacity and the possible quantity of pellets that may be able to deliver to its European customers.
It is worth noting that Ferrexpo produces pellets only for foreign markets. Earlier, it sent around 30 per cent or more than 3 million tonnes of its annual volumes by rail to the European Union. The company prefer to use the railway border crossings from Ukraine to Hungary and Slovakia.