IMOD-X PROJECT Intermodal Solutions for Competitive Transport in Serbia
FINAL REPORT Short Summary
REPUBLIC OF SERBIA MINISTRY OF CAPITAL INVESTMENTS BELGRADE, SERBIA
FACULTY OF TRANSPORT AND TRAFFIC ENGINEERING
SINTEF TECHNOLOGY AND SOCIETY DEPARTMENT OF LOGISTICS TRONDHEIM, NORWAY BELGRADE, SERBIA
November, 2006 Status: Final
Project Partners:
Ministry of Capital Investments of the Republic of Serbia Address: Nemanjina 22-26 11000 Belgrade, Serbia
Contact: Mr. Miodrag Poledica Head of Department for Railway and Intermodal Transport Phone: (+381) (0)11 361 66 13
SINTEF Technology and Society Address: S.P. Andersens vei 5 NO-7465 Trondheim, Norway
Contact: Mr. Tor Nicolaisen, Project Manager Research Scientist Phone: (+47) 73 59 46 70 E-mail: [email protected] Web: www.sintef.no
Department of Logistics, Faculty of Transport and Traffic Engineering Address: Vojvode Stepe 305 11000 Belgrade, Serbia
Contact: Assc. Prof. Slobodan Zecevic, PhD Chairman of Department Phone: (+381) (0)11 30 91 237
This report is a joint property of the project partners. Use of information from this report in any form requires reference to the source.
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Contents:
1 General Project Information...... 4 2 Executive Summary ...... 5 2.1 Conclusion ...... 5 2.2 Project Structure and Implementation ...... 5 3 Project Description ...... 8 3.1 Project Background...... 8 3.2 Project Objectives ...... 9 4 Status and Good Practice...... 10 4.1 Current Situation, Plans, and Trends ...... 10 4.1.1 Relevant Studies and Projects ...... 10 4.1.2 Overview of Transport Sectors in Serbia...... 11 4.2 Macroeconomic Framework ...... 24 4.2.1 Population in Serbia ...... 24 4.2.2 Economy of Serbia...... 25 4.2.3 Freight and Transport Flows ...... 27 4.3 Plans and Trends ...... 32 4.3.1 Development Trends...... 33 4.4 Good Practice ...... 34 5 Gap Analysis of Market and Services...... 36 5.1 Interviews ...... 36 5.2 Case...... 37 5.2.1 Factors Reducing Competitiveness of Rail Transport ...... 38 6 Solutions for Intermodal Services...... 41 6.1 Quantitative Analysis...... 41 6.1.1 Analysis Methodology ...... 41 6.1.2 Analysis Results...... 43 6.2 Holistic Concept of Terminal Development ...... 47 7 Implementation of Services and Further Process...... 49 7.1 Implementation Concept ...... 49 7.2 Important Knowledge ...... 49 7.3 Important Actors and Tasks ...... 50 7.4 Practical Steps Forward ...... 51 8 Annex 1. Transport Networks in Serbia...... 53 9 Annex 2. Ports in Serbia...... 56 10 Annex 3. Macroeconomic Framework...... 57 11 Annex 4. Transport Strategy and Policy...... 60
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1 General Project Information
Feasibility study of terminals and services for intermodal transport on Pan European Corridor X construction project and in the rest of Project Title: Republic of Serbia. The project is hereafter referred to as IMOD-X project.
Country: Republic of Serbia
Organisation: SINTEF Technology and Society
1. Ministry of Capital Investments of the Republic of Serbia Co-operation 2. Faculty of Transport and Traffic Engineering, University of partners: Belgrade (Department of Logistics)1
Recipient: Ministry of Capital Investments of the Republic of Serbia
1 For full contact details of the project partners, please refer to the list of project partners at the beginning.
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2 Executive Summary
2.1 Conclusion Since Belgrade already is a hub concerning transport, network of modes, and activities, as well as the most economic beneficial location of a terminal, it is also reasonable that a start of the intermodal solutions development takes place here. To step up the development and avoid loosing time a clear advice is to focus on the development in the Belgrade area. During a period of time to experience market penetration and service functionality, and in cooperation with the service providers, the development of 1-2 additional terminal locations could be within the range of economic viability.
2.2 Project Structure and Implementation The project has consisted of several tasks, namely: The inception phase Phase I: Status and Best Practice Phase II: Gap analysis of market and services Phase III: Solutions for intermodal services Phase IV: Implementation strategies
During the inception phase a detailed project plan was submitted and accepted by the cooperating partners, the Serbian authorities and the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs – the granting institution.
Project implementation Based on the project objectives, the project partners defined activities and tasks necessary for meeting of the stated project objectives. The main project phases and tasks, with the start and completion date, are represented in a Gant diagram (fig. 4.1, page 11).
Status and good practice The objective of seeking best practice solutions is to learn from the successful examples and avoid the unsuccessful. However, taken into consideration the stage of development Serbia is in, it has been difficult to find similar premises for the best examples of solutions. Therefore, the project gave advice concerning the important stages and issues for the development of intermodal solutions. As a consequence, hereto, the focus have changed from the “Best practice” (BP) to “Good practice” (GP). When using the term “Good practice”, it can be to a larger extent looked for solutions, with the reference to the Serbian situation, for which there are reasons to believe will function.
Gap analysis of market and services In addition to the collection of data on transport flows (Status and Good Practice section), the project conducted series of interviews with the local companies in order to form more complete picture on the gap between the current and desired future situation with regard to the intermodal transport (ImT) service offer in Serbia. The interviews helped pinpoint main problems and obstacles responsible for the gap. The interviews were structured and pre-defined. The interviewed companies are companies having significant share on the market they operate in and represent both the demand and supply side of the transport sector in Serbia.
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Solutions for intermodal services As a part of the process of describing solutions for intermodal services, it has been carried out quantitative analysis of effects of the intermodal terminals development. The documentation consists of a presentation of the quantitative analysis and a presentation of a holistic concept for terminal development.
The three groups of effects were considered in the analysis of effects of the intermodal terminals development:
1. Economic Effects 2. Time Saving Effects 3. Environmental Effects
It is clear that the road transport is superior in terms of the costs and time to the intermodal transport today. However, the differences are not that big and the negative numbers are consequence of used input time estimations (e.g. time for formation of a train, average speed of a train, etc.) and today’s average unit costs, which definitely will change in favour of the intermodal transport in the future.
It is also of crucial importance to bear in mind that in addition to the operational cost situation described above, the volume of investments required for each of the alternatives presented and the business concept and economics for the service providers, has to be studied and added. According to the international good practice solutions, the most actual concept of development will be to focus on the catchments area, the terminal location, and the possibility of realising competitive transport service solutions. The vital concerns are:
• Description of the catchments area, types of actual cargo, volumes, and other important properties. • Calculation of investment costs, which consist of connecting mode (road and intersection and (if actual) port), rail terminal area with sufficient bearing capacity, and rail tracks. • Composition of cargo volumes, rail costs, and tariffs that allow for viable business concepts for the service providers (e.g. rail services, terminal services, trucking services, and other logistic services).
Since Belgrade already is a hub concerning transport, network of modes and activity, it is also reasonable that a start of the intermodal solutions development takes place here. Examples of detailed studies to be undertaken are:
• Description of the cargo flows (demand) within a fair catchments area around Belgrade. The size of the catchments area could be calculated as the origins/destinations within the reach for distribution during one normal working day. E.g. within 2-3 hours driving time (truck on road), which leaves 2-3 hours for handling and service time. With an average driving speed of 65 km/h, the area will be then within a radius of 130-195km from Belgrade. • The basic investment costs needed to get a first version of a terminal up and running. As pointed out, the bearing capacity of foundation (i.e. concrete) is one of the main concerns. A proper initial investment level could be in the range of 5-10 million Euros, included 2-3 reach-stackers (loading/unloading capacity).
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Implementation of services and further process The project has emphasised on documenting the existing situation concerning the freight transport and intermodal solutions. It is concluded with the need to focus on the reduction of the rail service costs and the development of an intermodal hub in/at Belgrade, as well as 1-2 additional road/rail-terminals of sufficient size and viable catchments areas (which are most likely to be localised in/at bigger cities and/or cargo- intensive regions in Serbia).
As a part of the implementation phase, it is of the paramount importance to establish a network of direct stakeholders and interest organisations, with a common understanding and motivation, concerning the development of intermodal solutions. The process and work with the establishment and development of the coherence function of this network of stakeholders is of critical importance for the planning and practical implementation of the intermodal transport solutions.
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3 Project Description
3.1 Project Background Serbia, thanks to the favourable geographical position, has traditionally played the role of a transit country between the Western and South-Eastern Europe. This role was important for economic development of the country in the past and is expected to be very important in the future. This expectation is further supported by the recent starting-up of rehabilitation works on the Pan-European Corridor X and greater integration of the country in the Europe.
The Corridor X represents the shortest rail and road link between Western and South- Eastern Europe. The Corridor X and its branches are seen by the European Union (EU) as the axes of high volume multimodal transport between Western and South-Eastern Europe, and further Middle East and Trans-Caucasian regions. The rehabilitation of Corridor X is being done under the auspices of EU and one-third of the total Corridor X length is going through Serbia.
The rehabilitation of Corridor X and recent positive economic developments in the region will bring high volume of the transport to Serbia. The REBIS2 study estimates that the freight and passenger traffic, in a moderate growth scenario, will increase by 250-350% by 2025, and that the maximum capacity of the present transport infrastructure will thus edge ever closer. Therefore, authorities in Serbia are looking for upgrading of the transport infrastructure and new transport solutions.
In 2003, the Ministry of Transport and Telecommunications3 (MoTT) in Serbia identified the intermodal transport as the possible solution to this increased volume of the transport to, from, and through Serbia in the near future. The intermodal transport enables fast and safe transport of high volume of goods, while reducing road congestions, air pollution, and road accidents at the same time. The intermodal transport requires technologies that can be accommodated by the current transport technologies in Serbia. In addition, the intermodal transport will bring transport services in Serbia closer to the European standards. Hence, the MoTT has expressed strong need for the feasibility study of this mode of transport in Serbia and prioritised the project.
In October 2003, the MoTT and SINTEF had initial meetings and decided to jointly develop project proposal for a feasibility study of the intermodal transport in Serbia and submit it to the Norwegian Government for financing. The project proposal was approved and received the granting in December 2004. The Faculty of Transport and Traffic Engineering (FTTE) at the University of Belgrade joined the process of project proposal development and project implementation.
There are several completed and underway projects dealing with the transport sector in Serbia and the Balkan region, in general. The most comprehensive one is above mentioned REBIS study. The REBIS study was completed in July 2003 and focused on the development of multimodal Core Transport Network in the Balkan region. One of the
2 Regional Balkans Infrastructure Study, Transport, Final Report, July 2003. European Commission 2000 CARDS Programme. 3 As of March 2004, the Ministry of Transport and Telecommunications has become fully integrated into the Ministry of Capital Investments.
8 Status: Final main findings of the study was that the region and Corridor X offer possibilities for development of the intermodal transport and that further studies are needed. In particular, the market and organisational study that will closer analyse conditions and requirements for implementation of the intermodal transport in the region are recommended.
3.2 Project Objectives The main project objectives were two fold:
1. Evaluate possibilities for organisation of the intermodal transport and develop economic and technical concepts necessary for development of the competitive intermodal transport services in Serbia. This will include defining and evaluating of: a. Forecast of the freight flows b. Recommendations for the future development of the intermodal transport c. Locations of the future intermodal terminals
2. Transfer necessary knowledge and build capacity at the Department for Railway and Intermodal Transport at MoTT (now at MoCI) and the Department of Logistics at FTTE.
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4 Status and Good Practice
4.1 Current Situation, Plans, and Trends
4.1.1 Relevant Studies and Projects TIRS Transport Infrastructure Regional Study, finished in 2002 and financed by the French Government proposed 223 projects for the development of new and rehabilitation of the existing infrastructural facilities on the defined regional transport network. The study involved 7 Balkan countries: Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Yugoslavia, Macedonia, and Romania. Regarding the intermodal transport, 2 projects were proposed with a remark that some additional research and analysis should be conducted before the final decision on financing is made.
REBIS Regional Balkan Infrastructure Study, finished in 2003 and financed by EU, focused on development of the regional multimodal core network and on defining projects suitable for the international financing. The study involved following Balkan countries: Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, and Serbia & Montenegro (including Kosovo), and defined more than 200 projects on the multimodal core network, among which 137 projects were proposed for the short term investment plan. Regarding the intermodal transport, the study identified main problems and gave suggestion for conducting the market and capacity study, organizational, policy, and long-term investment study as the starting points for improvement of the intermodal transport sector in the Balkan region.
Development of Intermodality on the Corridor X and on Belgrade-Bar Railway Line Study was conducted by CIP- Institute of transportation- from Belgrade in 2002. The study focused on introducing hucke-pack traffic on the Belgrade-Subotica and Belgrade- Sid lines and proposed a solution for development of the Ro-La terminal in Zemun.
JBIC Pilot Study for Project Formation for Transport Network Development in Western Balkans was financed by JBIC (Japan Bank for International Cooperation) and finished in 2005. The main objective of study was to identify promising regional infrastructure projects in the Western Balkans as the potential candidates for the future JBIC financing. As a result, the study proposed assistance strategy of JBIC for development of the transport network in the Western Balkans.
Goods Flows Analysis with Respect to the Development Concept of the Logistics Intermodal Transport in Smederevo Municipality Study was done by the FTTE in 2003. Based on the total import, export, and transit flows of Serbia, the study estimated flows gravitating to the potential intermodal terminal in Smederevo. The potential intermodal transport flows were presented in the number of containers, Ro-Ro, and hucke-pack units. In addition, the study defined concept for development of the freight transport centre in Smederevo based on these potential intermodal transport flows.
Master Plan for Inland Waterway Transports in Serbia was financed by EU and finished in 2005 (draft version). The study described the present situation and capacity of the network of fairways: the Danube, Sava, and Tisa river and Hydro-system Danube- Tisa-Danube. It also gave traffic forecast for the evaluation of different plans and investment proposals on the river network. The traffic forecast was based on the three scenarios of possible development of the Serbian economy to 2025 (Isolation-
10 Status: Final pessimistic, EU Integration- realistic, and Balkan tiger- optimistic) and three transport strategies (Status Quo, International standards, and Highway). The study conducted cost-benefit analysis of the proposed projects for the EU Integration scenario and the two transport strategies- the International standards and Highway. Based on the results of analysis, the study concluded that investments in the Serbian IWT would be economically feasible. In addition, the institutional and legal framework of IWT was presented and some reforms proposed. Regarding intermodal transport development, six container terminal development options were considered and it was proposed to initially enable proper container handling at the ports of Belgrade or Pancevo.
TDTS Tri-modal Danube Terminal in Serbia Study was financed by the Ministry of Transport, Innovations and Technologies of Austria and finished in 2004. The main goal of study was to develop a foundation for deciding the future location of intermodal terminal in the Belgrade area (on the Danube). Based on the analysis of current state of transport sector and the forecast of freight flows in Serbia, the study concluded that construction of a big container terminal is not economically feasible. Consequently, it was suggested to rent a smaller area were it would be possible to start with a Ro-La and container service in cooperation with the WienCont - Intercontainer Austria. The study also defined basic renting conditions, potential services, handling equipment, and terminal operators.
4.1.2 Overview of Transport Sectors in Serbia
4.1.2.1 Road Transport Today, the road transport in Serbia is the most competitive mode of transport. The reasons for this are competitive prices and satisfying density of the road network.
Road Network The entire road network in Serbia includes 40 691km of roads, whereas 5 452km are the main roads, 11 459km are the regional roads, and 23 780km are the local roads (including Kosovo). The main roads include 422km of motorways and 212.5km of semi- motorways with the pay toll. The Serbian road network is also part of international E-road network with the E-70, E-75, and E-80 roads passing through its territory, in total length of 1500km (Annex 1, fig. 1).
The road network coverage is at satisfying level. There is no need for construction of the completely new roads (only to improve certain existing routes). About 32% of the main and regional roads are older than 20 years and only 14% is less than 10 years old. The estimated value of Serbian road network is 13 billion US$.
The main road corridor in Serbia is Corridor X with its branches Xb and Xc. In Serbia, the main part of Corridor X goes from the Croatian border to Macedonian border. The branch Xb of Corridor X goes from the Hungarian border to Belgrade, whereas branch Xc goes from Nis to the Bulgarian border. On the national level, this corridor is a key link between Belgrade and the major regional industrial centres and is very important in terms of the high traffic volumes.
The substantial portion of Corridor X has been developed to the motorway standard: from Sid (Croatian border) to Belgrade and further to Leskovac (South-Eastern Serbia), and on the branch Xb from Batajnica (close to Belgrade) to Novi Sad (the Beska bridge).
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According to the REBIS study, the motorway Novi Sad-Belgrade and completion of Belgrade by-pass are the main bottlenecks on the Corridor X in Serbia. The completion of these two projects is expected in 2007.
The other important road links in Serbia are: o Road E-70- follows Corridor X from Croatian border to Belgrade and then continues towards Vrsac and Romanian border connecting Belgrade and Timisoara (Romania), o Road E-763- besides the Corridor X, one of the main roads in the country, connecting industrial centres in the western part of Serbia (Belgrade, Cacak, Uzice, Prijepolje, and Bar (Montenegro)), o Road E-761- is connecting Corridor X from Belgrade to Nis and E-763 road, and is passing through Krusevac, Kraljevo, and Cacak, and o Some additional routes in Serbia which have been defined by the REBIS study as a part of the regional Core Network: o Route 5 (connecting Corridor X from Paracin to the Bulgarian border), o Route 6 (connecting Western Serbia with Kosovo), and o Route 7 (from Nis to Kosovo and further to Albania).
Organisation Since November 2005, the Public Enterprise Roads of Serbia has been responsible for managing, development, maintenance, and utilisation of the main and regional roads in Serbia. The new company has been established by the new Roads Law and is replacing formerly responsible state agency for the roads in Serbia- the Road Directorate.
There are 575 registered road transport companies in Serbia. In average, the freight vehicles are 16 years old and the fleet requires gradual renewing. Around 1500 freight vehicles are with the Euro III motor standard, 1800 with the Euro II motor standard, 170 with the Euro I motor standard and 1800 freight vehicles are on the so-called “black list” (vehicles not fulfilling Euro I, II, or III motor standards).
Plans Currently, Serbia does not have long term development strategy and policy for the road transport. However, by signing the MoU for development of the South East European Core Regional Transport Network, Serbia accepted obligation to develop, maintain, reconstruct, rehabilitate and upgrade infrastructure on the multimodal Regional Core Transport Network, which includes also road transport infrastructure.
The main plans of Public Enterprise Roads of Serbia are related to the improvement of competitiveness of Corridor X and improvement of the pavement of existing roads according to the EU standards.
There are ongoing negotiations with the European Investment Bank (EIB) for granting the funds for reconstruction of the Gazela, Pancevo and Zezelj Bridge.
The network development plans are related to the upgrading of certain routes to the motorway standard: o Semi-motorway E-75 from Belgrade to the Hungarian border, the Corridor Xb branch, o Two lane road E-75 from Leskovac to the Macedonian border, the Corridor X, o Two lane road E-80 from Nis to the Bulgarian border, the Corridor Xc branch,
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o Two lane road E-70 from Pancevo to the Romanian border (future motorway Belgrade-Timisoara), and o Two lane road E-763 from Belgrade to Bar (Montenegro) (future motorway Belgrade-South Adriatic).
4.1.2.2 Railway Transport In 2002, the freight volumes transported by railways have been reduced more than twice since 1991. The main reasons for this are: significant decline in the industrial production, dissolution of Former Yugoslavia, destruction of the infrastructural facilities during NATO bombing in 1999, insufficient investments in maintenance and upgrading, development of the service sector in Serbia requiring more flexible transport for the valuable goods, etc.
Railway Network The railway network in Serbia (Annex 1, fig. 2) consist of 3 809km of tracks, whereas 3 534km are single-track and 275km are double-track lines. About 32% of all tracks are electrified. In 2002, the maximum speed allowed was 60 km/h on 42.8%, between 60 and 80 km/h on 11.3%, and between 80 and 100 km/h on 45.9% of the network. During the 1990s, the regular maintenance has been minimized resulting in deterioration of the infrastructure and large portion of locomotives and wagons getting out of the service.
The main railway corridors in Serbia are the Corridor X, with its branches Xb and Xc, and the railway line Belgrade-Bar. The railway Corridor X line goes from Sid (Croatian border) to Presevo (Macedonian border), the branch Xb from Subotica (Hungarian border) to Belgrade, and the branch Xc from Nis to Dimitrovgrad (Bulgarian border). The Corridor X makes around 25% of the entire railway network and carries about 50% of the total traffic in Serbia. The line from Sid to Presevo is electrified. The stretches Sid- Belgrade and Velika Plana-Nis are double track lines.
The branch Xb, Belgrade-Subotica, is single track and electrified line. The modernisation of section between Stara Pazova and the Hungarian border is one of the priorities for the Serbian Railways. The branch Xc Nis-Dimitrovgrad is single-track and non-electrified line. Recently, 6 tunnels and 19 bridges on this line have been reconstructed for the electrification purposes. Also, the reconstruction of Dimitrovgrad station was finished during the last year and it represents the joint railway station for Serbia and Bulgaria on the Serbian-Bulgarian border.
One of the main bottlenecks on the Corridor X is the road-rail bridge at Novi Sad, built in 2000, in order to replace Zezelj Bridge destroyed during NATO bombing in 1999. The traffic on this bridge is alternating between the road and rail.
The railway service on the Corridor X is considered as slow and average commercial speed of the freight trains on the entire network is around 32 km/h (recommended speed for the freight trains in Europe is 50 km/h).
The situation with the Belgrade-Bar line is even more severe. The feasibility study for this line was done in mid 1990s, but no works have been carried yet.
Organisation As in the case with the other Balkan countries, the railway sector in Serbia is currently in the transition process. The Serbian Railways company has been restructured and it is expected that within two years it would become holding company with the sectors for the
13 Status: Final passenger transport, freight transport, infrastructure, and maintenance of the rolling stock. Currently, the company is employing 22 300 workers, whereas in 2001 the number of employees was 33 500. The share of state budget in the total revenue of Serbian Railways is reduced from 67% in 2000 to 45% in 2005.
The Serbian Government adopted new Railway Law in 2005. By this law, the Public Enterprise Serbian Railways has been established. The new company took over rights, duties, resources, and employees from ZTP Belgrade, company that has been a national railway operator until the adoption of new law. According the law, the main role of Serbian Railways is to operate railway infrastructure and to carry out local and international transport. The Serbian Railways, i.e. ZTP Beograd, is also founder of ZIT Company- the operator of container terminal in Belgrade.
By the new law, the transport service and management of infrastructure in the railway sector are separated giving the opportunity to both foreign and domestic operators to operate on the Serbian transport market. It also introduces the Railway Directorate, which is responsible for the technical regulations, issuing licences and certificates for carrying out transport, etc. The Railway Directorate has started working on 6 May 2005.
The organisation of traffic on the railway network in Serbia gives priority to the passenger trains, whereas in the freight transport, the priority is given to the intermodal consignments.
Rolling Stock Same as with the infrastructure, the rolling stock is in a very serious condition in Serbia. In average, the locomotives are 29 years old. In 2005, the Serbian Railways disposed with 156 electric locomotives and 194 diesel locomotives, among which 45% and 19% were operational, respectively. Out of 10 535 freight wagons, 3 480 wagons were operational (33%) in 2005.
Codification The official railway network codification in Serbia has not been completed yet. Some test rides are being carried out in order to determine the code number of the railway lines. It has been determined that hucke-pack units, with the code numbers P/C 70, C400, and P/C 80, can be transported on the network.
In 2005, the test rides on the network have been conducted in order to investigate the possibility of introducing Ro-La transport service on the Serbian railway network. The tests revealed that Ro-La traffic can be established on following lines: o Subotica (Hungarian border)- Dimitrovgrad (Bulgarian border); o Sid (Croatian border) – Stara Pazova; o Trupale – Presevo (Macedonian border), but with the certain speed limitations.
There are also certain obstacles for Ro-La traffic on some sections within the Belgrade railway node.
Plans According to the MoCI, there are ongoing negotiations with the EIB for granting the funds for reconstruction and modernisation of the Belgrade-Sid, Belgrade-Nis, and Nis- Dimitrovgrad railway sections. In the next three years, the reconstruction of several
14 Status: Final bridges is planned as well as modernisation of several important railway sections on these lines.
The completion of railway station Prokop (Belgrade) is also one of the important projects for the Serbian Railways. The new station is planned to take over the role of main railway station in Belgrade.
Within the REBIS study, the pre-feasibility studies for railway transport in Serbia were conducted for following projects: o The rehabilitation of Belgrade-Stara Pazova-Tovarnik line; o The improvement of Belgrade-Nis line; o The reconstruction of bridges across Sava and Danube; o The reconstruction of destroyed Zezelj bridge in Novi Sad.
4.1.2.3 Inland Waterway Transport The current state of inland waterway transport in Serbia is characterized by the small traffic volumes on the network and low utilisation of ports. In 2002, the level of inland waterway traffic was about 25% of the traffic in 1988. The current state of ports infrastructure is relatively poor and the current level of operation of Serbian ports is 10- 20% of their installed capacities. Many factors have contributed to this situation: obsolete fleet and lack of investments, change in the ownership structure and transition process of the ports and shipping companies, complex and non-transparent institutional and legal framework, and partially implemented River Information Services (RIS).
Inland waterway network The total length of inland waterway system (IWS) in Serbia is about 1 677km (Annex 1, fig. 3). The basic elements of IWS are the Danube (Corridor VII), Sava, and Tisa River, as well as the network of navigable canals- the Hydro-system Danube-Tisa-Danube (HS DTD).
Danube River The length of Danube through Serbia is 588km, which is 21% of its total length. According to the European classification (AGN4), the navigability of Danube from the Hungarian border to Belgrade is of Class VIb and from Belgrade to the Bulgarian border is of Class VII.
Due to the NATO bombing in 1999 and destruction of bridges, the safe navigability on the Danube is still not fully restored. There are also a few sectors on the Danube where the navigation is not safe due to sunken vessels and unexploded ordnances in the riverbed from WWII.
Sava River In 2004, the Sava has gained international status. The navigability of the Sava is of Class III, even though its status would require navigability of Class IV. By the AGN Agreement, the part of Sava from Sisak (Croatia) to Belgrade is included in the European inland waterway network of the international importance.
4 The standard used in the European Union for classifying the navigability of inland waterways is the European Agreement on Main Inland Waterways of International Importance (AGN).
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Currently, the Sava is in so called "natural regime" and requires significant investments for the maintenance and navigational aids. In addition, the Serbian sector of river is considered as of hindered navigability due to the presence of damaged bridges and unexploded ordnances from the NATO bombing in 1999.
Tisa River The Tisa River is classified as an interstate river and is subject to bilateral operational agreements between Serbia and Hungary. By the AGN agreement, it is included in the European inland waterway network of the international importance. This agreement requires navigability of the Class IV, although the Tisa does not meet this requirement.
Hydro-system Danube-Tisa-Danube The HS DTD is mostly used for irrigation, although navigational conditions are generally good. The problems that can endanger safe navigation are: inadequate dimension of the canals, lack of marking and navigational signs, under water vegetation and vegetation on the banks of canals, insufficient free height of bridges, and neglected locks.
The foreign ships need to pay a fee and obtain an official approval for using the HS DTD. However, the procedure for getting approval is complicated and time consuming.
Port of Belgrade The port of Belgrade lies on the Danube and occupies area of 100 ha. It is connected to the main European and regional roads as well as the railway lines. The port transhipment capacity is 7 000 t/day of bulk cargo, 7 000 t/day of general cargo, and 12 000 TEUs/year.
The Port of Belgrade has all required technical conditions for introduction of the hucke- pack technology and Ro-Ro traffic. The port, however, has no available space for expansion since the port is located in the congested central area of Belgrade.
Port of Pancevo The Pancevo port lies on the Danube and occupies area of 240 ha, including the space for expansion. The port transhipment capacity is 10 000 t/day of bulk cargo, 10 000 t/day of general cargo, and 5 000 TEUs/year.
The road linkage to the Corridor X goes along the Pancevo Bridge on the Danube, and then through the congested Belgrade centre. The Belgrade Master Plan envisages the construction of a new bridge over the Danube at Vinca, which will give Pancevo new connection to the highway and Belgrade bypass. The railway connection with Corridor X is via the Pancevo bridge and then by single, non-electrified line along the Sava.
The other main international ports in Serbia are: Smederevo, Novi Sad, and Prahovo. The main domestic ports are: Apatin, Kovin, and Backa Palanka on the Danube; Sremska Mitrovica and Sabac on the Sava; Senta on the Tisa; and Sombor on the HS DTD. The description of equipment and main physical characteristics of the international ports are given in the Annex 2.
Organisation The Sector for Water Transport and Navigation Safety within MoCI is the controlling body for inland waterway transport. It consists of the Department for Water Transport and 13 harbour offices. The department is responsible for managing and monitoring inland
16 Status: Final waterway transport and safety, conducting studies and analysis, and running activities in the area of international cooperation, conventions, and agreements.
The Plovput is a public company for maintenance, development, arrangement, and protection of inland waterways, development of plans, and granting approvals for constructing ports and related facilities.
The Jugoregistar is a governmental institution for the type standards and registration of the inland waterway vessels.
The two main shipping companies in Serbia are the Heroj Pinki and JRB (Jugoslovensko Recno Brodarstvo).
The Law of Inland Navigation exists from 1994 and is still in force.
Fleet The present condition of inland waterway fleet is rather poor due to the age and technical-technological obsolescence. The largest part of Serbian fleet is older than 25 years and push barges are primarily of the Europe class 1 and 2. The most modern ship sailing under the Serbian flag is a self propelled multi-purpose vessel with the capacity of 56 containers and possibility to push barges.
Plans and projects The present state of Serbian inland fairways requires sizeable interventions in order to restore former level of traffic and freight volumes. It requires, among others, dredging and training works, construction of new bridges, major overhaul of the locks, removal of the WWII wrecks and sunken vessels, marking of the fairways, improvement of the ports, and implementation of RIS system (River Information Services). All these interventions and works are recommended by the projects such as the Master Plan for Inland Waterway Transports in Serbia, TIRS, and REBIS.
4.1.2.4 Air Transport The air transport and traffic in Serbia have been severely reduced due to the international suctions from 1992-2000, involving ban on all flights, and NATO bombing in 1999. At the same time, the import of related devices and spare parts was also banned resulting in the deterioration of facilities and equipment. The ban on flights was permanently lifted in 2000 and since then air transport has experienced significant growth (about 15% per year, mostly due to the low initial level).
Airports There are four civil airports in Serbia and two among them are open for the international traffic: the Nikola Tesla Airport in Belgrade (with a 3 400 m long runway) and the Konstantin Veliki Airport in Nis (with a 2 500 m long runway).
The Nikola Tesla Airport in Belgrade lies at the centre of the south-east network of air routes. It is owned by the Government of the Republic of Serbia and the privatization is envisioned to take place in the next few years. The airport capacity is 5.6 million passengers per year. In 2004, the number of passengers was 2.05 million, whereas in 1987 passenger traffic was in total 3.5 million.
17 Status: Final
The cargo terminal at the airport in Belgrade has a storage area of 5 500m² and additional 2 500m² for accommodation of the operative services, forwarding agencies, and customs. The maximum capacity of terminal is 35 000 t/year and total terminal throughput in 2004 was 9 084 tonnes of goods.
The Airport in Nis was severely damaged during NATO bombing in 1999 and reopened again after reconstruction in 2003 financed by the Government of the Kingdom of Norway.
Organisation In the aviation sector, the two principal bodies are the Civil Aviation Directorate (CAD) and the Serbian and Montenegro Air Traffic Service Agency Ltd (SMATSA).
The CAD was established at the beginning of 2004 and has regulatory and inspection role. The CAD also cooperates with the international organizations such as ICAO, ECAC, EASA, Euro-control, and JAA.
The SMATSA provides traffic control in Serbia & Montenegro and is also operating an education centre for the air traffic control staff.
The relevant domestic companies in the air transport sector are the JAT Airways, Aviogenex (charter company), Cosmas (private company for cargo transport), Air Pink and Prince Air (private air taxi operators), and two handling agents (one owned by JAT Airways and one privately owned).
The JAT Airways is the national flag carrier, a public company, owned by the state of Serbia. Its main activities are airline operation, aircrafts maintenance and service, handling, air taxi, etc. It has 15 operational aircrafts with an average age of 24 years. The aging fleet is the reason for limited competitiveness with respect to the noise and other environmental issues in relation to the other air carriers in Europe.
The legal framework of aviation sector is based on the existing Air Law dating back to the period of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (1998). The work on the new Air Law started in the year 2000, but it has still not been completed.
Plans and projects The reconstruction of Nikola Tesla Airport started with the Airport Belgrade- Gateway to Serbia project in 2003, and continued with several others such as TIRS, REBIS, and Master Plan for Belgrade Airport. As a result, the reconstruction of passenger terminal T2 and runway pavement have been finished, and the feasibility study and tender procedure for the cargo hub and logistics centre have been done. The main strategic goal of Nikola Tesla Airport is to become a regional hub for the passenger and cargo transport.
4.1.2.5 Intermodal Transport In general, the intermodal transport is hardly developed in Serbia. It is mostly identified with the land transport of maritime containers (intercontinental traffic). The transport flows involving other intermodal technologies such as hucke-pack and Ro-Ro are practically not existent in Serbia mostly due to the lack of specific terminals.
There is no Ro-La terminal or terminal for the Ro-Ro transport in Serbia. The domestic transport companies do not practically have swap bodies as well as required vehicles for
18 Status: Final their transport and handling capacities. They have, however, about 500 open top containers, mostly 20’, but they can only be used inside Serbia because they are not registered for the international transport.
In the railway transport, only three series of wagons are used in the intermodal transport. Those are flat wagons of K, R, and S series and they are adapted for the transport of containers. The recent codification on railways has defined railway lines where it is possible to transport containers in the intermodal transport. In the inland waterway transport, on the other hand, the container carrier with the capacity of 56 TEU is at disposal.
There are many reasons for the current situation regarding intermodal transport and the main are5: o The present transport flows on key routes are low and insufficiently organized which hinders establishment of frequent regular through trains. o The transport flows are unbalanced since they relate mainly to the import of goods which poses the problem of returning empty containers. o There is no clear government policy for the development of combined transport. o The organizational framework is complex, characterized by unclear relationship and poorly defined role of each partner involved in the combined transport. o There are no fiscal incentives in favour of combined transport regarding leasing or purchasing special vehicles, handling equipment, swap bodies and containers, and there is no exemption from tariff regulations for initial or final road haulage stages.
4.1.2.5.1 Containerisation There is no reliable statistics for the container traffic published by the official statistical agencies. It is assumed, however, that the level of container traffic is below 0.5% of the total traffic6. It relates mostly to the land transport of maritime containers (intercontinental traffic), and its main sources and destinations can be divided into two regions- the North Europe (the ports of Hamburg and Rotterdam) and Mediterranean (the ports of Bar, Rijeka, Koper, and Thessalonica). Meanwhile, the intra-continental traffic is on very low level and remains unexplored in spite of its potential: the volumes of continental trade are much higher than overseas trade and it involves longer distances (longer inland transport).
There are three partly developed container terminals in Serbia: ZIT railway terminal, the port of Belgrade, and the port of Pancevo. These terminals mostly employ multifunctional equipments and universal devices which enable transhipment of containers and some hucke-pack transport units (trailers and semi-trailers).
Container Terminal at the Port of Belgrade The container terminal at the port of Belgrade has transhipment capacity of 12 000 TEUs/year. The level of utilization was 10% in 2002 (table 4.1). The transport infrastructure of terminal enables handling of containers from the vessels, railway
5 REBIS, Final Report, 2003. 6 The flow of unitised traffic (container and swap bodies) in the Balkan countries accounts for less than 0.5% of the total traffic by the REBIS study. The TDTS project also cites that the level of container traffic in Serbia barely reaches 0.4-0.5% of the total traffic.
19 Status: Final wagons, and road vehicles. It has at disposal the covered overhead crane with 50t lifting capacity, container manipulator (27t), and warehouse system of 5 000m2.
The terminal location near the city centre is favourable for the import containerised cargo destined for the city. The location of terminal, however, is not ideal for the outgoing containers and cargo via road traffic because it is requiring passing through the entire city in order to reach the main road (the Corridor X).
Table 4.1. Annual port throughput in TEU units Trans-shipment statistics: 20' and 40' containers (in TEU) Port Year 2001 2002 2003 Belgrade 804 1 298 2 136 Novi Sad n/a n/a n/a Pancevo 100 300 500 Source: Tri-modal Danube Terminal in Serbia, Final Report, 2004
ZIT Railway Terminal The ZIT railway terminal is located nearby the central railway station in Belgrade. The terminal has good road and rail connections, 8 000m2 of covered storage area, and 20 000m2 of open storage area. It is equipped with a gantry crane able to handle both 20’ and 40’ containers, 3 auto cranes, 22 forklifts, fleet of 350 containers (mostly 20’ open top), and 17 semi trailers. The Belgrade Master Plan indicates that ZIT terminal will be moved from the present location in the medium term future.
The terminal had a traffic volume of 10 000 TEU in 2001, mainly from the port of Koper (table 4.2). The container flows were largely unbalanced as import share was 85% and the most of these imports were from China (70% of total). At the present, the container transport by train from Bar (Montenegro) does not exist, since the tunnels do not meet technical requirements.
Table 4.2. Container traffic registered by ZIT in TEU for the year 2001 Ports TEU Koper 4 005 Rijeka 1 300 Bar 1 800 Thessalonica 1 800 Northern European ports 1 000 Total 9 905 Source: REBIS, Final Report, 2003
4.1.2.5.2 Organisational Framework The organisational framework is characterised by unclearly defined roles and functions of the various actors involved in the intermodal transport. The ZIT Railway Terminal, for instance, has not clarified the market position yet. At present, they combine the function of a terminal operator and a forwarding agent, operating its own fleet of trucks.
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In 2004, Slovenian, Croatian, and Serbian railways established “Sava Express” service, a train transporting wagonloads and containers. There are also problems with this line in terms of unclear roles between the railways and customers (forwarding agents).
There are no regular block trains with the origin/destination in Serbia (since the Sava Express is changing configuration (including and/or excluding of the wagons/carriages) on its route). In 2005, the first regular container shipping line between the ports of Belgrade and Constance (Romania) was introduced.
In September 2006, the new rolling motorway (Ro-La) was started between Wels (Austria) and Halkali (Turkey) connecting over a distance of nearly 2000km- Austria, Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia, Bulgaria, and Turkey. The Ro-La trains are operated by 6 railway companies and the wagons are owned by Ökombi. The project was lunched by the Austrian and Turkish partners.
The first pilot train left Wels on 16 September 2006 and the first train from Halkali left on 21 September 2006. The Ro-La trains are unaccompanied, since the drivers take the plane from Istanbul to Vienna. It has been planned to run during this pilot operations five trains in both directions (one per week). If the customers in Turkey are satisfied with the service (in terms of the transit time and costs), the daily trains in both directions could be established.
4.1.2.5.3 Institutional Framework In this section, the main public institutions and companies involved in preparing and implementing the regulations, which directly or indirectly affect the development of intermodal transport, are described.
The MoCI is responsible for developing and implementing transport policies and strategies, and administering the legal framework of the transport sector. It includes 10 sectors and number of departments among which is the Department for Railway and Intermodal Transport.
The Department for Railway and Intermodal Transport has a mission to create and implement policy and strategy for the railway and intermodal transport in Serbia. The main tasks of department include analysing present condition of the railway and intermodal transport, preparing measures and suggestions for improvement, drafting laws and regulations, preparing bilateral and multilateral agreements, etc. In addition, the department participate in the work of international organisations and their working groups such as CEMT, UNECE, and BSEC.
In January 2006, the Serbian Railways formed the Department for Intermodal Transport within the Sector for Freight Transport. The main tasks of this department include defining proposals for the combined transport of goods, monitoring of consignments, analysing transport efficiency, proposing measures for quality improvement, etc.
At the beginning of 2006, the Working Group (consisting of the representatives from the MoCI, Serbian Railways, and Serbian Chamber of Commerce) finished a Final Report on possibility for founding the National Association for Combined Transport- Srbijakombi. The report proposed founding model, ownership structure, mission and main functions of the association. According to the report, the Serbian Railways would be a major
21 Status: Final shareholder with the possibility to include foreign capital. The two main functions of the association would be developmental and commercial.
The Association of Transport and Telecommunications within the Serbian Chamber of Commerce represents interests of the actors in the transport sector and issues carnets, certificates, forms, container control forms, etc. This association has an important role in promoting the intermodal transport and representing interests of all intermodal transport actors before the state and economic organisations.
The Directorate for Environmental Protection within the Ministry of Science and Environmental Protection of the Republic of Serbia is dealing with the issues of the environmental protection. The regulations proposed by this directorate can incite development of the intermodal transport by forcing the users and actors of the transport system to consider external effects of the specific transport solution.
The land development agencies at the cities and towns in Serbia are responsible, among other things, for performing complete procedures for land leasing for the construction of logistic systems and related facilities.
The Sector for Customs System and Policy within the Ministry of Finance of the Republic of Serbia is in charge for drafting laws and other regulations in regard to the customs procedures, monitoring, preferences, customs and free zones, etc. The sector influences the quality and competitiveness of the intermodal transport service by defining the customs procedures and regulations.
The current state of border-crossings in Serbia is characterised by the long waiting times, overlapping of responsibilities, lack of staff, lack of infrastructural capacities, insufficient coordination in terms of border management, etc. In 2003, Serbia & Montenegro joined the Program of Trade and Transport Facilitation in Southeast Europe (TTFSE) and some positive progress has been made since (reduction of the waiting time, increase of the customs income, etc.).
There are several border-crossing inspections: sanitary, veterinary, phyto-sanitary, and ecological. These controls influence the total transport time and most of the problems refer to the insufficient number of inspectors, short working times, waiting on the radiology tests, etc. Since July 2006, the responsibility for preliminary radiology control of goods has been transferred from the ecological inspection to the customs. This measure is expected to accelerate and simplify inspection controls, and reduce waiting time at the borders.
4.1.2.5.4 Regulatory framework In the past 15 years, the intermodal transport has been weakly regulated by the laws and agreements. Recently, the steps are being made in regulating this field and acknowledging its importance.
The new Railway Law represents a step forward in acknowledgment of the importance of intermodal transport and its inherent advantages.
According to this law, the chapter 72, the obligation of social transport service refers also to the intermodal transport of goods. If this obligation is not in the commercial interest of
22 Status: Final transport operator, the transport operator has the right to the reimbursement from the state of Serbia (the difference between the real and predefined transport price).
The Rule Book on Combined Transport regulates transport of combined units as regular consignments under specific technical conditions for the intermodal units, wagons, and railway tracks as well as it defines main issues regarding organisation of the combined transport. The preparation of this rule book is underway.
The Planning and Construction Law regulates classification and ownership of land, plans needing to be taken into account when considering potential locations for the facilities (including terminals), construction conditions (regarding responsibility, project documentation and its content, procedures, etc.), and all other issues important for the process of leasing the land and building the terminal infrastructure.
The above mentioned law classifies the construction land into two categories: 1) the public construction land (in the state/municipality ownership) and 2) other construction land (in all forms of the ownership). The land designated for the development of transport belongs to the public construction land.
One can only acquire the exclusive "right of use" for the public construction land and other construction land in the state ownership. The investor can lease the land for maximum 99 years, with the possibility to extend this leasing period afterwards.
Customs regulations Many container transport operators consider the existing customs laws and regulations in Serbia as discriminative for the container transport in relation to the other transport modes. In their opinion, the complete container transport is identified with the import of goods from Asia, which are “high risk” goods.
When containers with textile, footwear, and other consumer goods from Asia are imported to Serbia, the customs defines exact place where customs clearance is to be conducted and this is often not according to the needs of final user. The customs clearance of these containers can be done only in few cities: Belgrade, Nis, and Sid, and container stripping is mandatory.
When containers are exported from Serbia, it is required to conduct customs procedures in the nearest customs terminal. In this way, the starting point of main (international) part of journey is predefined and it is not allowed for the user and intermodal transport operator to choose the most economical transport solution.
The problems regarding customs procedure also refer to the inadequate recording of intermodal transport units. As a result, it is not possible to obtain reliable and relevant statistical data on intermodal flows in Serbia.
Presently, the containers are treated in Serbia as the items of import. Every move needs to be reported to the customs resulting in the delays and financial expenses. In order to simplify procedures in the container transport, the Serbian Chamber of Commerce introduced the container control form, a document accompanying each container, in December 2004.
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Bilateral agreements and cooperation The activities of the Department for Railway and Intermodal Transport, MoCI, regarding development of the intermodal transport include preparing bilateral and multilateral agreements and cooperation. Since 2002, several bilateral agreements with other countries have been finalised and signed up in order to facilitate the international combined transport of goods:
o Serbia & Montenegro and Bulgaria (ratified in 2003), o Serbia & Montenegro and Croatia (ratified in 2006), o Serbia & Montenegro and Hungary (finalized in 2005), and o Serbia & Montenegro and Slovakia (initiated in 2005).
The acquired benefits and stimulating measures envisaged by these agreements are:
o Exception from road licenses (permits) and road tolls for pre-carriage and on- carriage by road, o Dwell time of up to 30 minutes at the border crossing points for trains in the combined transport, o Instigation of the transport companies to adopt and coordinate support measures in regard to the development of combined transport, o Support the investments in railway, ports, and intermodal terminal infrastructure, o Exception from bans on driving during the weekends and holidays for pre- carriage and on-carriage by road in the combined transport, o Permissible maximum weight of 44t for pre-carriage and on-carriage by road in the combined transport, o Accelerating controls at the customs and transferring border procedures to the terminals of combined transport, o Cooperation and assistance on founding the associations for combined transport, and o Mutually notifying about measures for quality improvement of the combined transport and logistics service.
The European Agreement on Important International Combined Transport Lines and Related Installations – AGTC was ratified in 2005. Joining this agreement, the essential prerequisites have been provided for attracting foreign financial investments in the transport infrastructure and related installations.
In addition, the international activities include bilateral cooperation between Serbia and Austria.
4.2 Macroeconomic Framework
4.2.1 Population in Serbia According to the official census in 2002, the population in Serbia was 7.5 million of people. About 21% of the entire population, 1.6 million, live and work in Belgrade, which is the administrative and economic centre of the country. The other bigger cities in Serbia are Novi Sad, Nis, Kragujevac, Leskovac, and Subotica and they all are lying along the Corridor X (Annex 3, fig. 1).
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Activity According to the Statistical Office data in 2003, 1 813 570 people were employed in Serbia, which makes around 53.4% of the total active population7. Out of this number, 38% were employed in the services sector, 25.7% in the processing industry, 23.7% were conducting occupation on their own, and 3.6% in the agriculture. The districts with the highest employment rate were the Pirotski with 47.8%, Belgrade with 44.2%, and Juzno-banatski District with 40.3%.
The districts with the highest activity in the processing industry are: the Pcinjski (43.6%), Moravicki (43.6%), Pirotski (42.5%), and Rasinski (40.3% of the total employment in this district). The processing industry sectors with the highest employment rate in Serbia are the food, textile, metal, and automotive industry.
The districts with the highest activity in the agriculture in 2003 were: the Zapadno-backi (13%), Srednje-banatski (11.9%), Severno-banatski, and Severno-backi (10%).
In 2001, there were 21% of unemployed people in Serbia. This number has increased during last few years and in 2005 it was around 25%.
4.2.2 Economy of Serbia At the beginning of 90s, the former Yugoslavia was one of the most developed countries in the Balkans. However, the economic sanctions imposed by EU in 1992, and dissolution of former Yugoslavia and ensuing civil war have resulted in the severe economic and social crisis. The industrial production has drastically declined during this period and large portion of population has impoverished.
Although the service sector has significant share in GDP, in the following text only the industry and agricultural sector have been described, since they are of interest for analysis and forecast of the freight transport flows.
GDP Between 1990 and 2000, the Serbian GDP decreased more than twice. At the end of 80s, the GDP in Serbia was around 2 800US$ per capita and in 2000 it was 1 071 US$ per capita. After 2000, the Serbian GDP has been growing with the average yearly rate of 5.1%, which is mainly based on the growth of agricultural and service sector.
In 2004, the large share of GDP came from the service sector (61%), then industry (24.8%), and the smallest from the agriculture sector (14.2%). The processing industry produced 16.6% of GDP in 2004, whereas almost 7% came from the food and chemical industry.
No official strategies for the economic development of Serbia have been adopted yet. However, there are certain estimations for the growth of Serbian GDP. The moderate scenario of REBIS study envisages Serbian GDP growth of 5% between 2006 and 2025, the National Strategy for EU Accession also envisages growth of 5% to 2010, and the Strategy for Economic Development of Serbia to 2010 estimates GDP growth of 8.55%8.
7 The active population are persons at age of 15 or older, employed, unemployed, or temporarily unemployed. The active population in Serbia accounted for 3 398 227 persons in 2003. 8 The Strategy for Economic Development of Serbia to 2010 was finished in 2002 but still has not been officially adopted.
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Industry The Serbian industry is in the transition process, which started at the beginning of 90s, but stagnated during the period of turmoil from 1992 to 2000. In 2002, the privatisation process has been resumed and until 2006, 1892 companies have been privatised in Serbia. Besides the privatisation process, there is ongoing restructuring of the big public companies in order to rationalise number of the employees and establish holding companies.
In 2004, the industrial production in Serbia was around 40% of the production in 1989. After 2000, the highest growth in industry was noted in 2004 when production increased for 7.1% in relation to the previous year. This increase was based on 9.6% growth of production in the processing industry.
In the following text, the volumes of industrial production have been described. The year 2003 has been used as the basis as this was the latest year for which all relevant data were available in the project.
According to the Statistical Office data in 2003, the Serbian industry produced total of 77.4 million tonnes of goods. The most significant volumes are produced by the extraction industries such as coal, ores, and other minerals (around 50 million of tonnes). The dominant sectors of processing industry in Serbia are the food and beverages, oil derivates, metals, and chemicals production.
The figure 2 in Annex 3 shows 24 districts in Serbia with the industrial production volumes for specific industrial sectors. It should be noted that only the processing industry sectors are presented, without construction materials production and extraction industries. This is because consumption of these goods is related mostly to the domestic usage and as such is not interesting for analysing effects of the industrial production on the international transport flows (which are interesting for the intermodal transport).
The districts with the largest production are: o Juzno-banatski with 4.5 million tonnes of produced goods (the dominant sector is oil derivatives production with 3 million tonnes), o Podunavski with 2.5 million tonnes (Smederevo, a town in this district, is considered to be a centre of the metal industry in Serbia), o Juzno-backi with 1.5 million tonnes (the food and beverages, and oil derivates production sector have the biggest share in the production of goods), and o Belgrade with 1.2 million tonnes (with 1 million tonnes of the food and beverage products).
Based on the production volume figures, it can be noticed that the southern part of the county has very low level of industrial production. The districts with the lowest production in Serbia are Toplicki, Pirotski, Kolubarski, and Jablanicki.
In order to have better overview of the potentials for generation and attraction of the freight flows in Serbia, the figure 3 in the Annex 3 presents number of inhabitants, employees, and industrial production for each district.
Agriculture The Republic of Serbia has significant potentials for diverse agricultural production. According to the Statistical Office data in 2003, the districts with highest production of
26 Status: Final wheat, corn, and other industrial plants were Sremski with 1.08 million tonnes, Juzno- backi with 1.02 million tonnes, Juzno-banatski with 810 000 tonnes, Zapadno-backi with 711 000 tonnes, and Srednje-banatski with 530 000 tonnes.
The fruit and vegetables production is mostly located in the Nisavski District with 207 000 tonnes, Belgrade District with 150 000 tonnes, the Zlatiborski District with 150 000 tonnes, the Rasinski District with 144 000 tonnes, and the Sumadijski District with 130 000 tonnes of produced goods. The live stock farming districts are the Macvanski, Zlatiborski, Branicevski, and Juzno-banatski.
4.2.3 Freight and Transport Flows In the 90s, the significant decrease in economic activities and transport demand took place in Serbia. The import, export and transit flows have been severely reduced due to the dissolution of Yugoslavia and ensuing civil war, international sanctions, NATO bombing campaign in 1999, and decrease of industrial production.
In the past few years, the import and export of goods have increased affecting the overall enlargement of transport volumes. The yearly external trade is presented in the figure 4.1 indicating positive growth trends from the year 2000 and onward.
Figure 4.1. Values of import and export per years (in mil. USD)
mil.USD export import 12000
10000
8000
6000
4000
2000
0 1990 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004
Source: Serbian Statistical Yearbook, 2005
Within this section, the export, import, and transit transport flows are described. The reference year is 2002, since this year has been used as the basis for cargo forecast and analysis. The statistical data from the previous period, i.e. until 1991, are not relevant, since they relate to the transport market and trade of the former Yugoslavia. The transport and freight data from 1991 to 2001 are affected by many economic and socio- political factors and as such can not be representative nor be used for cargo forecasting purposes. The statistical data for 2004 have been available, but they do not refer to the import and export flows of the districts in Serbia as data from 20029.
9 All statistical data about export, import, and transit flows are obtained from the Statistical Office of the Republic of Serbia. However, the data for 2002 and 2004 differ concerning commodity classification and level of presentation (the district or republic level).
27 Status: Final
Import and export figures The total external trade of Serbia & Montenegro in 2002 amounted to 15 946 026 tonnes of goods, where of 68.8% was the import. The cereals, metals, glass, petroleum products and gas accounted for about 52% of the total export. The crude petroleum, petroleum products, gas, and chemicals dominated in the total import (45.1%).
Table 4.3. Exported and imported commodities in 2002 export import No Commodity tonnes (%) tonnes (%) 1 Cereals 981790 19,7 26717 0,2 2 Fresh fruit and vegetables 263097 5,3 331660 3,0 3 Live animals 2756 0,1 735 0,0 4 Food products, food for cattle, tobacco 450166 9,0 652330 5,9 5 Oil seeds, oil nuts, animal or vegetable oils and fats 47162 0,9 58172 0,5 6 Wood, cork 248048 5,0 478143 4,4 7 Fertilizers 17703 0,4 341135 3,1 8 Crude minerals other than ore 82501 1,7 407389 3,7 9 Iron ore, scrap iron 103527 2,1 332655 3,0 10 Non-ferrous metal ores and concentrates 22214 0,4 53251 0,5 11 Textile, textile products, textile fibres 16388 0,3 50622 0,5 12 Pulp and waste paper 41956 0,8 37316 0,3 13 Solid fuels 70837 1,4 551636 5,0 14 Crude petroleum 6411 0,1 2557355 23,3 15 Petroleum products, gas 517452 10,4 1660125 15,1 16 Tars and crude chemicals from coal and natural gas 5 0,0 13736 0,1 17 Chemicals 341577 6,9 737124 6,7 18 Lime and construction material 220078 4,4 370356 3,4 19 Glass, glass products and ceramics 523859 10,5 154449 1,4 20 Metals 593109 11,9 413163 3,8 21 Metal products 129814 2,6 168533 1,5 22 Machinery, transport equipment 105974 2,1 298764 2,7 23 Miscellaneous manufactured articles 158258 3,2 322730 2,9 24 Special transactions 17469 0,4 99788 0,9 25 Unknown 18164 0,4 847824 7,7 Total 4.980.316 100,0 10.965.710 100,0 Source: Serbian Statistical Office
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Figure 4.2. Export and import of commodity groups and their volumes
volume (1000t) export import 3000
2500
2000
1500
1000
500
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 commodity
Source: Serbian Statistical Office
More than 96% of all export flows was going to the European market, and more than 42% was going to the countries of former Yugoslavia. The most important export partners were countries in the region: Bosnia and Herzegovina (22.6%), Italy (10.4%), Republic of Macedonia (9.7%), and Rumania (8.2%). The export to these countries represented almost 50% of the total Serbian export in 2002. The major import partners were: Russia (28.8%), Bosnia and Herzegovina (8.5%), Ukraine (7%), and Croatia (5.5%) amounting to about 50% of the total import. The import from the former Yugoslavian countries accounted for 19.1% with the dominant share of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Figure 4.3. Export and import partners and volume of goods in 200210
(1000 t) export import 3500 3000 2500 2000 1500 1000 500 0 ASIA ITALY RUSSIA AFRICA POLAND TURKEY FRANCE GREECE AUSTRIA UKRAINE AMERICA RUMANIA SLOVAKIA BULGARIA GERMANY HUNGARY AUSTRALIA CZECH REPUBLIC OTHER EU COUNTRIES EU OTHER OTHER EUROPE COUNT. EUROPE OTHER
FORMER YUGOSLAV COUNT. Source: Serbian Statistical Office
10 The classification of countries, used by the Serbian Statistical Office for analysis of data, considers only 15 originally EU countries as EU (other 10 states are classified as the European countries).
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The distribution of export flows over districts in Serbia shows the importance of Belgrade as the main generator of Serbian export flows (30.2%). The Juzno-backi (23.5%) and Podunavski (8.3%) are also important export districts, while the other districts account for less than 5%. The same three districts dominate in the import with 69% of the total import, while the other districts account for less than 3.5% (fig. 4.4).
Figure 4.4. The distribution of export and import flows across the districts in 2002.
(1000 t) export import 4500 4000 3500 3000 2500 2000 1500 1000 500 0 KI KI KI KI KI KI KI Č Č Č Č Č Č EVSKI ARSKI RAŠKI INJSKI VANSKI Č BORSKI Č Č Č SREMSKI TOPLI NIŠAVSKI PIROTSKI P RASINSKI KOSOVSKI UNKNOWN BELGRADE MORAVI MA JABLANI ŠUMADIJSKI ZAJE KOLUBARSKI ZLATIBORSKI PODUNAVSKI POMORAVSKI JUŽNO-BA BRANI MONTENEGRO ZAPADNO-BA Č SEVERNO-BA JUŽNO-BANATSKI SREDNJE-BANATSKI KOSOV.-MITROVA SEVERNO-BANATSKI district KOSOV.-POMORAVSKI
Source: Serbian Statistical Office
The analysis of transport flows showed that in the export the road transport amounted to app. 60% (2.97 million tonnes) of the total transport. The shares of railway transport and IWT were 14.4% and 20.3%, respectively. On the other hand, the most of imported goods were transported by the pipelines and amounted to 32% (3.51 million tonnes) of the total transport. The shares of road transport and IWT in the import amounted to 29.4% and 16.3%, respectively (fig. 4.5).
Figure 4.5. Modal share of transport in the export and import flows in 2002.
100% 90% 80% RAIL 70% ROAD 60% IWT 50% MARITIME 40% PIPELINE 30% OTHER 20% 10% 0% export import
Source: Serbian Statistical Office
According to these data, the railway and inland waterway transport have considerable share in the total transport. However, this has to be taken with a precaution. There are many situations when the truck operators are transporting the goods without the proper
30 Status: Final paperwork (in order to avoid the taxes). Hence, the share of railway and IWT transport is much lower in the practice due to unknown exact freight volumes transported by the road.
The analysis of export freight flows shows that the most of goods leave Serbia via Bosnia and Herzegovina and Hungary, in total 42%. The goods are, on the other hand, usually imported to Serbia via Hungary and Romania, in total 43%.
The industry represents important source of exported goods and affects the volumes of import flows as well. In the total external trade in 2002, the products of processing industry had the highest share. The sectors of processing industry with the highest share in the export structure were: production of the food and beverages products, basic metals, chemicals and chemical products, and rubber and plastic products (in total 51.7%). The main sectors represented in the import flows were: production of the chemicals and chemical products, other machinery and equipment, motor vehicles and trailers, and food products and beverages (in total 48.7%).
Transit figures The total transit flows through Serbia & Montenegro in 2002 amounted to 8.28 million tonnes of goods. The metal products, miscellaneous manufactured articles, cereals, and the commodity in the category “unknown” accounted for 96% of the total transit volume.
Figure 4.6. Transit volumes by commodity types
(1000 t) 3500
3000
2500
2000
1500
1000
500
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 commodity
Source: Serbian Statistical Office
The most of transit freight entered Serbia & Montenegro via Hungary (35.5%), Romania (25.1%), and Bulgaria (20.3%). After transiting, the most of goods left Serbia via Hungary (34.8%), Bulgaria (20.4%), and Romania (17.3%).
The shares of road, IWT, and railway transport in the total transit transport were 43.1%, 35.2%, and 20.6%, respectively.
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Figure 4.7. Modal share of transport in the transit flows in 2002
0% 1% 21% RAIL 35% ROAD IWT PIPELINE OTHER 43%
Source: Serbian Statistical Office
The amount of transit goods transported by road was 3 566 489 tonnes in 2002, which makes 247 411 freight vehicles passing through Serbia & Montenegro for that year. About half of these volumes was transported between Germany, Italy, Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Croatia, Slovenia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, on one side, and Bulgaria, Turkey, Greece and Macedonia on the other (North/North West – South/South East direction). The freight vehicles registered in Turkey and Bulgaria transported 75% of the total freight on this direction. 87.5% of the total freight on this direction was transported via the Hungary/Croatia-Bulgaria routes and vice versa.
4.3 Plans and Trends The regulatory framework of transport system in Serbia is characterised by the plans and strategies that need to be renewed by adequate and compatible documents with the EU transport trends and legislation.
In the intermodal transport sector, there is no adequate governmental development policy. There are only two official documents that give strategic framework for the transport sector in Serbia and general guidelines for the intermodal transport development: o The Spatial Plan of Serbia for 2010, adopted by the Parliament of Serbia in 1996, considers the issues of transport and communications development and infrastructure allocation. o The Strategy and Policy of Transport Development in the Republic of Serbia to 2010, adopted by the Government in 1998. This document, however, has never been implemented due to the political changes.
The Spatial Plan of Serbia for 2010 envisioned construction of the intermodal transport centres, distribution centres, and terminals:
1. In the first phase, the development of 11 freight transportation centres (FTC) has been planned: Subotica, Sombor-Apatin, Novi Sad, Belgrade, Pancevo, Sabac, Kragujevac, Smederevo, Prahovo, Nis, and Dimitrovgrad; 2. In the second phase, the development of 19 FTC has been planned, depending on the demand and economic viability: Zrenjanin, Senta, Sremska Mitrovica, Backa Palanka, Kikinda, Vrsac, Pozarevac, Valjevo, Loznica, Uzice, Cacak, Kraljevo, Krusevac, Pristina, Kosovska Mitrovica, Leskovac, Presevo, Deneral Jankovic, and Novi Pazar
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The master plans of cities in Serbia such as Belgrade, Novi Sad, and Nis envisage and promote development of the logistic centres. The Belgrade Master Plan to 2021 envisages development of the logistics and freight transport systems. This plan envisages: two freight transportation centres (at Dobanovci and Vinca), two freight terminals (the Port of Belgrade and economic zone Gornji Zemun), one freight distribution centre (at Ada Huja), and two distribution centres (at Batajnica and Highway zone ).
Recently, the draft version of Strategy and Policy of Transport Sector Development in Serbia has been finished. According to this document, the reforms need to be undertaken in the regulatory, organisational, and commercial policy in the early phase of the intermodal transport development. In order to avoid scattered investments and to make use as much as possible of the large scale economy, it is proposed to concentrate on the required multimodal facilities initially. The main strategic goals for intermodal transport sector to 2010 and guidelines for their implementation are presented in the table in Annex 4.
In order to achieve the goals of above strategy, it is necessary to prepare detailed Master Plans for development of the transport sectors. Up to now, two Master Plans have been done: the Master Plan for Inland Waterway Transport in Serbia (2006) and the Master Plan for Belgrade Airport (2003). Currently, the General Master Plan for Transport in Serbia is under preparation.
The Master Plan for Inland Waterway Transport in Serbia considers six container terminal development options. Due to the uncertainties, it is proposed to initially enable proper container handling at a terminal area in one of the two main ports near Belgrade, i.e. Belgrade or Pancevo. In the case of increased container penetration on the Serbian IWT network, the decision can be made either on the expansion of initial facilities or the development of a new container terminal.
The development of intermodal transport is also planned within the Rolling Plan of Serbian Railways for 2006-2010. The proposed investments include construction of intermodal terminals (Belgrade, Nis, and Novi Sad) and loading gauges UIC C for tunnels and bridges as well as procurement of the terminal handling equipment.
4.3.1 Development Trends One of the important factors affecting transport services demand is economic development of the country. The GDP is the main indicator of economic development.
The Serbian GDP growth has fluctuated in the past few years. In 2000 it was 5.2%, in 2001 it was 5.1%, in 2002 it was 4.5%, in 2003 it was 2.4% and in 2004 it was 9.3%. As it was mentioned earlier, the certain prognoses for GDP growth are given in the REBIS study, National Strategy for EU Accession, and Strategy for Economic Development of Serbia to 2010.
Strategy for Economic Development to 2010 The Serbian Government initiated this strategy in 2002 and the main goal was to identify the industrial sectors in Serbia having the biggest potential to contribute to the GDP growth and overall economic competitiveness of the country in the future. The strategy identified 23 industrial sectors among which are wood and timber, textiles and clothes, leather, steel, metal, machinery, pharmaceutical, chemical, and transport sector. In the
33 Status: Final transport sector, the strategy recognised the development of intermodal transport as one of the measures for improvement of the entire sector.
According to the strategy, the GDP will grow 8.55% per year. The GDP of export orientated sectors will increase 15.1% per year and the export share in GDP will be most probably at 45%.
It should be noted, however, that this document has not been officially adopted yet. At the moment, the preparation of the new National Strategy for Economic development of Serbia 2006 – 2012 is underway.
National Strategy for EU Accession Since the EU accession represents national priority and long-term objective, the adoption of this strategy is of a great importance (2006). Besides political and democracy criteria for accession and preparations for specific obligations, this strategy also contains guidelines for economic and social development of Serbia. The Strategy envisages GDP growth rate of 5% per year to 2010 and around 4 300 US $ for GDP per capita.
This document suggests that the development strategy of industry should take into account market signals and identified perspective industrial sectors: the basic metals production, chemical industry (chemicals, detergents, pharmaceutical, and rubber products), agriculture, machinery production, motor vehicles and trailers production, textile, footwear and clothes industry and wooden products production.
In the transport sector, this strategy suggests that infrastructural investments should be equal for all transport modes with slightly advantage in favour of the railway, inland waterway, and intermodal transport.
4.4 Good Practice The objective of seeking best practice solutions is to learn from the successful examples and avoid the unsuccessful. However, taken into consideration the stage of development Serbia is in, it has been difficult to find similar premises for the best examples of solutions. This chapter therefore contains advice concerning important stages and issues of the development of intermodal solutions. As a consequence, hereto, we also have changed the focus from “Best practice” (BP) to “Good practice” (GP). When using the term “Good practice”, we can more be looking for solutions we, with our knowledge of the Serbian situation, believe will function here.
This task involves providing a coarse description of relevant good practice solutions on different issues related to the intermodal transport. The issues of interest are:
• Successive development of intermodal solutions. The role of infrastructure (network and terminals), actors, and regulations. • Reliable information/knowledge of the market situation (today, trend, and future). • Responsibilities and cooperation (concerning public authorities and private actors). Including regulation, day-to-day-activity, ownership, etc. • Network and structure of terminals. • Combination of cargo type, freight integration, and terminal layout.
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Successive development of intermodal solutions Since the development of the demand for freight transport form a crucial premise for types of transport services to establish, a successive and coherent interaction between supply and demand actors will be necessary.
Good practice elements are: • Status of the organisation of the National Transportation Planning System. • Status of National Transportation Plan (Transport Policy and Strategy document). • Practical elements of revision of the plans.
Reliable information/knowledge of the market situation The description of the market situation is a most important premise. Through this the knowledge of the production and transport situation are established.
Responsibilities and cooperation Since different private actors as well as public actors are involved in the production, transport and the end user activities, the cooperation between them is of crucial importance for the planning and implementation of the intermodal solutions in the freight transport.
Network and structure of terminals The general trend and good practice is that terminals participate in the cooperation between the terminals. This is also a question of specification of the terminal, and what types of transport/cargo each of them handles.
Combination of cargo type, freight integration, and terminal layout The freight integration is becoming more and more a vital concern of the actors using the terminal.
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5 Gap Analysis of Market and Services In addition to the collection of data on current situation of the transport sector in Serbia (section Status and Good Practice), within the scope of project the series of interviews with the local companies have been conducted. The main purpose of the interviews was to form more complete picture on the gap between the current and desired future situation with regard to the ImT service offer in Serbia. The interviews pinpointed main problems and obstacles responsible for the gap. The interviews were structured and pre- defined.
5.1 Interviews The series of interviews was conducted during the winter 2005/2006 and 9 potential Serbian users/providers of intermodal transport were questioned. The interviewed companies are having significant share on the market they operate in and they are:
o IMLEK AD, Diary producer o NELT, Distributor o MILSPED, Trucking company o JUGOAGENT, Maritime and river shipping agency o SCHENKER Belgrade, Logistics provider o SERBIAN RAILWAYS, Railway operator in Serbia o ZIT, Railway terminal o PORT OF BELGRADE, river port (Danube) o SERBIAN ASSOCIATON OF INTERNATIONAL ROAD HAULIERS, independent, non-profit association
The interviews revealed that the intermodal transport have very low usage in Serbia. The transport in Serbia is mostly done as single, full loaded truck shipment. There have been little evidence of massed or groupage transports and to the extent such transport services exists, it is probably performed without the use of units suited for the intermodal transport. The intermodal transport in Serbia is mostly limited to the import of maritime containers and the return of empty containers to the port. The only case of transportation in swap bodies (Schenker to/from Hungary) was typically served by trucks rather than train.
The containers are being imported to and exported from Serbia mostly via the ports of Koper, (Slovenia), Rijeka (Croatia), Thessalonica (Greece), Constance (Romania), Bar (Montenegro), and Hamburg (Germany). In 2005, the containers imported to Serbia are estimated at 15 000 TEUs and containerised exports are estimated at 5000 TEUs. We also received information that containers had been in some cases stripped in the port and sent on to Serbia by truck (around 20% of all imported containers).
The containers are exported mostly to USA and the Middle East, while they are imported mostly from the Far East (China) and USA. In 2005, the first regular container line on Danube was established between the ports of Belgrade and Constance (Romania). The manipulation of containers in Belgrade is being conducted in the port of Belgrade and ZIT terminal.
In 2004, the throughput of containers in the Belgrade port was app. 3000 TEUs, whereas the import/export ratio was 80% to 20%. In the same period, ZIT terminal handled 25 000
36 Status: Final open-top containers in domestic transport and 5 800 containers in the international transport.
According the statistical data in 2004, more than 120 000 trucks crossed the border from Croatia importing goods with a return flow of more than 140 000 trucks in export. A truck will typically transport 2- 2.5 TEUs. Even considering that many of these transport flows might be unsuitable for multimodal transport, the sheer size of the numbers indicates a large potential.
The distance is often considered as a limiting factor in the use of intermodal transport. The economic distance for rail/waterway usage is often considered to be over 500km. However, about 1/3 of the transport flows recorded in 2004 travel a total distance of a 1000km or more. There might also be cases where the goods itself are unsuitable for containerisation, and thereby unsuited for multimodal transport. The trend, however, is towards more and more specialized containers which increase the opportunities for multimodal transport.
Based on the analysis of interviews and answers, the following can be identified as the main problems and obstacles responsible for the gap between the current and desired future situation (developed and competitive ImT) on the transport market in Serbia:
o Weak export flows, due to weak industry production, which could support application of the intermodal transport units and keep balance between the import and export intermodal flows. o Inefficient and unreliable railway service in regard to the long transit time, poor organisation of the operations, and lack of the capacities (locomotives and special wagons). o The lack of modern terminals, modern handling equipment, and IT equipment for tracking and tracing of the containers in terminals, terminals open for handling dangerous goods, etc. o The complicated legislation and customs procedures, obsolete regulations, discrepancy with the European regulations, and non-compliance with the signed conventions, agreements, and treaties. o The lack of national transport strategy and policy that would define guidelines for the future intermodal transport development. o The lack of statistical data regarding the road transport and especially intermodal transport units in Serbia.
In order to better understand implications of the above problems and obstacles in the practice, the project decided to look at a case. Based on this case, some recommendations for improvement of the competitiveness of rail/waterways to truck transport are given.
5.2 Case We have selected the rail connection between Belgrade and Ljubljana/Koper as our case. This connection covers the transport to and from the main ports on the Adriatic sea- Rijeka and Koper. Zagreb and Ljubljana are both intersections with other major European transport corridors. The border crossing between Serbia and Croatia was also the single most trafficked border (import/export) according to the data from 2004 (presented at the Workshop 1).
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On the selected connection the competition is between use of railway and trucks. In fact, the transport flows are so dominated by the use of trucks that one might say that there is no competition. The railway transportation seems to be used only in cases where trucks are impractical for some reason.
The apparent lack of competitiveness for railway transport is according to our respondents mostly due to the transit time. The fastest transit is achieved by the “Sava Express” and takes 3 to 4 days. Normal freight trains are reported to take more than a week, sometimes as much as 10-11 days. Except for the “Sava Express” there are no regular scheduled trains to/from the port of Koper (Ljubljana). Regular freight trains are organised on demand and administrated on an ad hoc basis. The “Sava Express” is supposed to be a regular scheduled train with one weekly departure. In practice this has been difficult to fulfil, mainly due to the lack of cargo.
The Sava Express is a fairly new initiative. The train was planned as a block train between Ljubljana and Belgrade with 2 weekly departures. Transit time was planned at 12hrs. In practice the train combine wagonloads with containers and pick up wagons also in Zagreb. The planned transit time of 12hrs might be seen as overly optimistic. This was however the normal transit time for a train from Koper to Belgrade in the former Yugoslavia (end of the 1980s).
Our interviews were not that conclusive for to the price of rail transport as for the transit time. The Sava Express is marketed as a combined service, rail/road door to door. Accordingly, some transport companies claim that prices are not competitive while others state that prices are not the problem. This price discussion is however not all that important. It’s obvious from the low utilisation of the railways that the prices do not compensate for the poor quality and long transit times.
During our interviews, we feel that we have gained some insight into the causes for the railways lack of competitiveness. The rest of this text will discuss what in our view comprise the three main reasons.
5.2.1 Factors Reducing Competitiveness of Rail Transport
5.2.1.1 Customs Control/Customs Regulations The single factor that everybody points to when explaining the low usage of multimodal/rail transports in Serbia is customs control/customs regulations at the borders. With respect to the Ljubljana/Belgrade railway connection there are several reasons for this:
• There is no inspection office at the border between Serbia and Croatia connected to the railway. Inspection officers must in each case be called from the nearby road border crossing (Batrovci). • Serbia formerly required customs papers to be made out for each wagon of the train. The papers needed to be checked and approved separately for each wagon. This is now changed so that a complete train can be approved on one set of papers. • Serbia requires radiological checking of the whole train.
These and other factors all contribute to long and unpredictable delays at the border. Up to 30 hrs wait was reported but delays of around 5-6 hrs were more common.
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Compared to the 3-4 days transit time between Ljubljana and Belgrade, the delay at the border does not seem very significant. However, it is the unpredictability of the delay that is the major problem. Under such conditions it’s impossible to schedule the train through to Belgrade.
5.2.1.2 Operation of Trains The “Sava Express” from Ljubljana to Belgrade uses about 12 hrs to get to the border between Croatia and Serbia. To be on the safe side say that customs uses another 5-6 hrs at the border. This in fact means that Serbian railways use 2-3 days to move the train 130 tariff kilometres from the border to Belgrade if the information about transit time is correct. How is this possible?
The answer probably lies in how trains are operated. Serbian railways claim lack of locomotives and specially shunting locomotives as the major reason for long transit time. Trains will sit at stations waiting for locomotives.
The unpredictable time spent in customs will add to this problem. Locomotives are probably allocated on an ad hoc basis when trains become available for further transport. Time spent waiting for a locomotive is however not enough to explain 2-3 days transit over 130km.
The key in our view is probably that there are at least three major train stations between the border and Belgrade. The lack of cargo as is witnessed by the fact that the “Sava Express” now has a frequency of less than once weekly implies that the train from Ljubljana combine cargo to several destinations in Serbia. The trains are thereby probably reorganised several times between the border and Belgrade. This hypothesis also accounts for the apparent lack of shunting locomotives in addition to the time spent.
There might be several other explanations as to why the Sava Express takes 2-3 days from the border to Belgrade. Other trains are reported by our respondents to use as much as 10 days on this transit. Whatever the explanation is, the transit time totally destroys the competitiveness of rail transport and results in ever decreasing amounts of cargo.
From our point of view, the Serbian railways has to move the trains to Belgrade within a reasonable amount of time. To achieve this, it is probably necessary to pull the whole train directly to Belgrade from the border without reorganising the wagons. Time should be set aside for customs control at the border and the train should achieve scheduled departure from the border. The locomotive can then meet the train after customs at the scheduled time. A single scheduled departure and transit will also simplify the planning of track availability and other resources.
It might be that moving the train unsorted from the border to Belgrade will lead to economic loss in the short run. The goal however, is to fill the train with goods bound for Belgrade and thus to eliminate the need for reorganisation of the wagons. From a competitive point of view the total transit time should not exceed 24 hrs. Trucks are able to deliver to customers in Serbia from the port of Koper or Rijeka within that timeframe.
It is also necessary to offer at least a twice weekly service. From the customers viewpoint transit time also includes the time when the cargo sits unmoving in the port as
39 Status: Final well as the delivery time at the endpoint. A once weekly service means that customers will look at 4 days transit time on the average even if the train is moved within one day.
5.2.1.3 Organisation of Railway Transport The best offer for railway transport to and from the ports of Rijeka and Koper is the Sava Express. This offer however is not “open” to all. The Sava Express is offered as a complete service including distribution and customs clearing. In other words, the offer is in direct competition with the traditional forwarding agents. No wonder that the agents are seeking other solutions.
As we pointed out earlier with the long transit time from port to Belgrade, the only goods that are transported by railroad are probably already containerised goods from overseas. Shipping companies who are responsible for most of these cargos usually have agreements with a number of forwarding agents. The cargo is thereby not available to the Sava Express unless they can establish some kind of cooperation with the shipping/forwarding agents or out-compete them. The last option we find unlikely to succeed.
The best way of establishing cooperation with the forwarding agents is to give them access to competitive transports. The agents are usually not very concerned about who performs the actual transports as long as they keep the connections to the end customers and shipping lines. The Serbian railways should be concerned about operating efficient railway transport and ZIT should concern themselves about effective terminal handling and distribution. Admittedly, there is money to be made as a forwarding agent, but why should this business tie in directly with the operation of the railways and railway terminals?
Around 10.000 TEUs of already containerised goods are imported to Serbia over the ports of Rijeka and Koper. Most of this cargo is probably imported to Belgrade. If the railways are able to attract all the containers bound for Belgrade, there should be enough containers for a twice weekly train from both Rijeka and Koper. These trains should be organised as pendulum block trains, going back and forth between the endpoints without reorganisation of the wagons on the way. The train should only serve the endpoints. A transit time of less than 24 hrs should be achievable. Projecting a 80 to 90 % capacity utilization, it’s also difficult to see that such a train should not be competitive with respect to the costs.
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6 Solutions for Intermodal Services As a part of the process of describing solutions for intermodal services, it has been carried out a quantitative analysis of effects of the intermodal terminals development. The documentation consists of a presentation of the quantitative analysis and a presentation of a holistic concept for terminal development.
6.1 Quantitative Analysis
6.1.1 Analysis Methodology Due to the unreliability of statistical data, the project had to develop a methodology for the analysis of preferred potential locations for the intermodal terminals in Serbia in terms of the economic, time, and environmental effects. The methodology is based on the idea of multiple assignment hub-network designing approach (O’Kelly et al, 1996) and the simulation modelling approach.
The input variables for the methodology and analysis were:
• The potential locations for intermodal terminals in Serbia • The intermodal transport flows volumes in Serbia for 2015 • The distribution of flows across inbound/outbound relations • The distribution of flows across districts in Serbia • The demand elasticity in respect to the number of terminals and terminal catchments area • The transport tariffs and operation times in the transport process • The data regarding the environmental impacts of the transport system
The potential locations for intermodal terminals in Serbia The three main alternatives, with a few sub-alternatives within them, for the potential locations of intermodal terminals in Serbia were considered (fig. 6.1). The main alternatives (including sub-alternatives) considered were:
1. One to three bimodal and/or trimodal terminals located in the strong economic centres. The following sub-alternatives were included: (BG), (BG, NS), (BG, NI), and (BG, NS, NI). 2. Six bimodal and/or trimodal terminals located along the Corridors X and VII. The following sub-alternatives were considered: (BG, NS, NI, SU, SD) and (BG, NS, NI, SU, SD, UE). 3. Twelve to fourteen bimodal and/or trimodal terminals located in the economic centres. The following sub-alternatives were considered: (BG, NS, NI, SU, SD, SE, SO, ŠA, JA, PŠ, UE, KG), (BG, NS, NI, SU, SD, SE, SO, ŠA, JA, PŠ, UE, KŠ), (BG, NS, NI, SU, SD, SE, SO, ŠA, JA, PŠ, UE, KŠ, PH), (BG, NS, NI, SU, SD, SE, SO, ŠA, JA, PŠ, UE, KŠ, KG, PH).
The potential locations for the intermodal terminals in Serbia are based on the Freight Traffic Network Plan (from The Spatial Plan of the Republic of Serbia) and the Strategy of the Economic Development of the Republic of Serbia to 2010.
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Subotica (SU) Senta (SE) Sombor (SO) Novi Sad (NS) Beograd (BG) Šabac (ŠA) Smederevo (SD) Prahovo (PH) Jagodina (JA) Užice (UE) Kruševac (KŠ) Kragujevac (KG) Niš (NI) Preševo (PŠ)
Figure 6.1. Potential locations of the intermodal terminals in Serbia
Here, it is worth noting that the above list of potential locations lists only cities and towns as indicators of the potential area for the intermodal terminals (macro locations). This area is not limited by the city/town municipality borders, but rather by the list of the potential micro locations in the wider area around that particular city/town. The Belgrade is typical example. The Belgrade location involves both the city of Belgrade, town of Pancevo (since the Pancevo is very close to the Belgrade), and other appropriate micro locations in the wider area of Belgrade. All these micro locations need to be considered and analysed in the process of final determination of the intermodal terminal locations.
The intermodal transport flows volumes in Serbia for 2015 Due to unreliability and unavailability of specific statistical data, the estimates of the intermodal transport flows in Serbia for 2015 were in addition done on the basis of the economic development of Serbia for 2015 and estimates for the intermodal transport flows in the European countries.
Based on the analysis of above data, the project selected three scenarios for the intermodal transport flows in Serbia for 2015:
• Pessimistic scenario for the import/export flows volumes- 80 000 TEU • Realistic scenario for the import/export flows volumes- 120 000 TEU • Optimistic scenario for the import/export flows volumes- 160 000 TEU
The distribution of flows across inbound/outbound relations The distribution of flows across inbound/outbound directions was done on the basis of average annual share of import/export flows, where the transport statistics for 2002 were used as a basis. Based on this, all source/destination countries were grouped into 4 groups according their participation in the total flows and distances:
1. The first group- Italy and Germany
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2. The second group- Ex-Yugoslavia countries 3. The third group- Overseas countries and continents (Canada, USA, Asia, Australia, etc.) 4. The fourth groups- All other countries
The distribution of flows across districts in Serbia Based on the similar studies and analysis done for the purpose of project, the districts in Serbia were grouped into 4 groups according to their size, GDP, and stage of development: 1. The first group- the Belgrade District 2. The second group- the Nis District and the districts in Vojvodina less developed then Belgrade 3. The third group- even lesser developed districts in Serbia 4. The fourth group- underdeveloped districts in Serbia.
The developed methodology takes into account and allows changes in the relative degree of development among the districts.
The demand elasticity in respect to the number of terminals and terminal catchments area Based on the similar studies, the project has adopted a small impact of the number of terminals on the increase of demand for the intermodal transport. It is adopted, for instance, 2-3% increase of the flows volumes when the number of terminals increases from 6 to 14.
The definition of terminal gravity zone was based on the premise that the volume of transport flows which gravitates to the specific terminal is inversely proportional to the distance to that terminal.
The transport tariffs and operation times in the transport process The transport tariffs and operational times in the transport process are based on the market prices and tariffs and estimates of the operation times.
The data regarding the environmental impacts of the transport system The data needed as well as the methodology are adopted from the web portal: Environment, Energy, and Transport PORTAL (www.eu-portal.net).
6.1.2 Analysis Results After feeding all the above data, the analysis and methodology turned out following results in terms of the three groups of effects:
1. Economic effects. They are calculated as a difference between the total operational costs of intermodal transport (as if the intermodal transport is developed and existing) and the total costs of road transport. The obtained negative values in this case mean that the costs of transport by the intermodal transport are higher than the road transport. 2. Time saving effects. They are calculated as a difference between the total times of transport by use of the intermodal transport and the road transport in the export/import flows. The negative values indicate that more time is used by the intermodal transport than the road transport.
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3. Environmental effects. They are calculated as a difference between the total emission of gasses by the road transport and the intermodal transport in the export/import flows. The gasses considered by the calculations are Carbon- Monoxide (CO), Nitrogen Oxides (NOx), and Volatile Organic Compounds (VOC).
The results are presented on the following figures and table. It is worth noting that these figures and tables show the results calculated under the supposition of the realistic scenario of intermodal transport flows for 2015 (120 000 TEU) and for the case when 5% of the container flows are realized by the river transportation11. The figures are in the form of normal distribution because some of the above input variables are normally distributed.
On the figure 6.2, it is obvious that the development of intermodal transport becomes economically justifiable with the decrease in the railway transport costs by 20% or more.
BG
700 BG NS
600 BG NI
BG NS NI 500 BG NS NI SU SD
400 BG NS NI SU SD UE
BG NS NI SU SD SE SO ŠA 300 JA PREŠEV O UE KG
BG NS NI SU SD SE SO ŠA JA PREŠEV O UE KŠ 200 BG NS NI SU SD SE SO ŠA JA PREŠEV O UE PRA HOV O KŠ 100 BG NS NI SU SD SE SO ŠA JA PREŠEV O UE PRA HOV O KŠ KG Troškovi železnice smanjeni 0 za 20% -20-15-10-5 0 5 1015Troškovi železnice smanjeni za 30% -100
Figure 6.2. Results of the analysis of economic effects (euro/tonne) The key: PREŠ- Preševo (PŠ) PRAH- Prahovo (PH) Troškovi železnice smanjeni za 20% (30%)- The railway costs decreased by 20% (30%).
The figure 6.3 shows results of the analysis of time saving effects of development of the intermodal terminals in Serbia. From the figure, it is clear that the road transport is superior in terms of the time to the intermodal transport today. However, the differences are not that big and the negative numbers are consequence of used input time estimations (e.g. time for formation of a train, average speed of a train, etc.) and today’s
11 The analysis involved three scenarios for the container flows realised by the river transportation (0%, 5%, and 10%).
44 Status: Final average unit costs, which definitely will change in favour of the intermodal transport in the future.
2000
1500
1000
500
0 -3,9 -3,8 -3,7 -3,6 -3,5 -3,4 -3,3 -3,2 -3,1 -3
-500
Figure 6.3. Results of the analysis of time saving effects (hours/tonne)
The figure 6.4, 6.5, and 6.6 show the results of analysis of environmental effects of development of the intermodal terminals in terms of CO, NOx, and VOC emissions. From the figures, it is clear that the intermodal transport is superior in terms of the gas emissions to the road transport.
3000
2500
2000
1500
1000
500
0 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 -500
Figure 6.4. Results of the analysis of CO emissions (grams/tonne)
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2500
2000
1500
1000
500
0 0 50 100 150 200 250
-500
Figure 6.5. Results of the analysis of VOC emissions (grams/tonne)
2500
2000
1500
1000
500
0 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45
-500
Figure 6.6. Results of the analysis of NOx emissions (grams/tonne)
The results in the following table are presented in the form of adjusted effects (as in case with the figures), i.e. total effects divided with the total volume of goods (expressed in tonnes). The results in terms of economic, time saving, and environmental effects are given for all location alternatives considered.
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Table 6.1. The results of analysis for all considered location alternatives Average savings in Average values of cost savings emission of gasses (euro/tonne) Average time (grams/tonne) Location alternatives savings Rail fees Rail fees Current rail (hours/tonne) decreased decreased CO NOx VOC fees by 20% by 30% BG -6.7 -2.4 -0.2 -3.38 49.6 26.1 129.9 BG, NS -7.7 -3.4 -1.2 -3.40 48.3 25.4 126.2 BG, NI -5.6 -1.2 1.1 -3.41 52.2 27.4 137.0 BG, NS, NI -5.1 -0.7 1.6 -3.38 52.6 27.6 138.2 BG, NS, NI, SU, SD -6.3 -1.8 0.5 -3.40 50.8 26.8 133.5 BG, NS, NI, SU, SD, UE -5.9 -1.4 0.9 -3.39 51.4 27.1 135.1 BG, NS, NI, SU, SD, SE, SO, ŠA, JA, PŠ, UE, KG -5.7 -1.1 1.2 -3.40 51.7 27.3 136.1 BG, NS, NI, SU, SD, SE, SO, ŠA, JA, PŠ, UE, KŠ -5.7 -1.1 1.2 -3.40 51.7 27.3 136.2 BG, NS, NI, SU, SD, SE, SO, ŠA, JA, PŠ, UE, KŠ, PH -5.9 -1.2 1.1 -3.41 51.7 27.3 136.0 BG, NS, NI, SU, SD, SE, SO, ŠA, JA, PŠ, UE, KŠ, KG, PH -5.5 -0.9 1.4 -3.41 52.1 27.5 137.2
As is it can be seen from the table, the alternative with the intermodal terminals in Belgrade (BG), Novi Sad (NS), and Nis (NI) appears to be best (of all considered) in terms of the economic, time saving, and environmental effects.
It is also of crucial importance to bear in mind that in addition to the operational cost above, the volume of investments required for each of the alternatives presented and the business concept and economics for the service providers have to be studied and added. According to the international good practice solutions, the most actual concept of development will be to focus on the catchments area, the terminal location, and the possibility of realising competitive transport service solutions.
6.2 Holistic Concept of Terminal Development As pointed out in the general analysis in section 6.1, the most actual concept of development will be to focus on the catchments area, the terminal location, and the possibility of realising competitive transport service solutions. The vital concerns are then:
• Description of the catchments area, types of actual cargo, volumes and other important properties. • Calculation of investment costs, which consist of connecting mode (road and intersection and (if actual) port), rail terminal area with sufficient bearing capacity, and rail tracks. • Composition of cargo volumes, rail costs, and tariffs that allow for viable business concepts for the service providers (e.g. rail services, terminal services, trucking services, and other logistic services).
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Since Belgrade already is a hub concerning transport, network of modes, and activities, it is also reasonable that a start of the intermodal solutions development takes place here. Examples of detailed studies to be undertaken are:
• Description of the cargo flows (demand) within a fair catchments area around Belgrade. The size of the catchments area could be calculated as the origins/destinations within the reach for distribution during one normal working day. E.g. within 2-3 hours driving time (truck on road), which leaves 2-3 hours for handling and service time. With an average driving speed of 65 km/h, the area will be then within a radius of 130-195km from Belgrade. • The basic investment costs needed to get a first version of a terminal up and running. As pointed out, the bearing capacity of foundation (i.e. concrete) is one of the main concerns. A proper initial investment level could be in the range of 5-10 million Euros, included 2-3 reach-stackers (loading/unloading capacity).
The size of the catchments area must be defined to achieve the needed economy of scale. This is based on the shipping agents being the intermodal (read: rail) service providers main customers, and with their terminals close to the intermodal terminal. The shipping agent is the distributor/collector of cargo for the intermodal (container) transport. And of course, the full loads (e.g. full containers) will be transported directly to the intermodal terminal, without handling at the shipping agents terminal (because in this case there is no need for consolidation of goods at the shipping agent terminal).
The cargo flow description must consist of a reasonable origin/destination pattern. This will be one of the main types of input data to a realistic description of a possible intermodal service (which consists of lifting equipment and train services). This description must be based on cargo volumes and fair cost elements (according to the type of equipment (i.e. lifting equipment) needed to handle certain volumes of cargo), which makes it economic viable for the professional service providers.
To step up the development and avoid loosing time a clear advice is to focus on the development in the Belgrade area. During a period of time to experience market penetration and service functionality, and in cooperation with the service providers, the development of 1-2 additional terminal locations could be within the range of economic viability.
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7 Implementation of Services and Further Process
7.1 Implementation Concept The present project has focused on documenting the existing situation concerning freight transport and finding suitable intermodal solution for Serbia. It is concluded with the need to focus on the reduction of rail service costs and the development of an intermodal hub at Belgrade, as well as 1-2 additional road/rail-terminals of sufficient size and viable catchments areas. These terminals are most likely to be localised at the bigger cities and cargo-intensive regions in Serbia.
The implementation of above conclusion will include a range of methods, spanning from the discussions, decision-making processes, training, workshops and network building to the specific analysis. In this process, the network building is of crucial importance due to the fact that the activity of an intermodal terminal involves several stakeholders. Hence, it will be very important to establish a common understanding and motivation among the stakeholders in the network.
During these network processes, the allowances for the priorities of public authorities, the economic viability for the service providers and suppliers, and the operational savings for the cargo owners will also be of the principal concern. In the end, it will be a matter of making visible win-win situations to the stakeholders in the scope.
Concerning the “manpower”, this stipulates a need for the hands-on management of the processes. Both from a concept implementing and practical point of view, the presence and visibility of management will be a vital premise.
7.2 Important Knowledge The intermodal transport services must be produced in such a way that they correspond to the demand for moving cargo and the prerequisites defined by the cargo owners and shipping agents. The intermodal transport operators have designed several types of production systems to achieve this.
An important property is the use of regular and scheduled production systems. Since large scale transport modes are used, it is necessary to consolidate the intermodal loading units at certain terminals in accordance with the fixed timetables. The terminal and infrastructure capacity will be limited, and therefore access to the infrastructure and terminal slots has to be planned. To ensure access, it is necessary to make plans in time before the service is performed and this often involves long-term agreements.
The development of productions systems as such, and the operational elements, will benefit from substantial knowledge concerning the variety of value chains involved concerning the specific cargo types of interest for the intermodal transport. The concept of integration in the value chain also involves the intermodal elements of transport.
Important knowledge elements then are: • Infrastructure elements, their capacities, safety, and quality properties. • Terminals, freight/logistics parks and distribution centres, their capacities, service, safety, and quality properties.
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• Topical network of terminals (domestic and international), with attitude concerning cooperation and services. • Transport modes and services, their capacities, safety, and quality properties. • Cargo owners and their value chains. Knowledge of cargo types and their properties, the state of integration and the choice of logistic systems will be most important as well as the development trends and forecast of specific cargo flows. • Regulations and customs situation.
7.3 Important Actors and Tasks There are several groups of actors with each of their specific tasks concerning intermodal transport solutions. In the proceeding sections they are presented with a short description.
The users of intermodal transport (the demand side): • Shippers. The shipper is the owner of the cargo and moves the cargo for further processing or marketing. Directly or on their behalf, the contracts are signed for these movements of cargo between locations. • Forwarders. They plan for the best way of moving the cargo and conduct the dialog with the logistics service providers with instructions on service required and the accompanying administrative procedures such as customs and freight document handling. They optimise the transport solutions on behalf of the shippers and/or logistics service providers. Historically, the most forwarders are associated with one particular transport mode. • Maritime and inland waterway (IWT) shipping lines. Due to the fact that ocean and IWT services are a complex and professional specific service, these actors take care of their interests in an optimal use of vessels involved and intermodal loading units (e.g. containers). • Logistics service providers and shipping agents. These are companies with logistics assets other than transport equipement, e.g. warehouses, cross-docking ramps and buildings, container freight yards, storage areas, and freight and distribution centres. Such logistics services often include ensuring cargo is available for the receiver on time and replenishment of the customer stocks.
The practical mode operators (the supply side) consist of: • Terminal operators. Their responsibility is to tranship loading units between the long-haul transport modes (train, IWT/short sea vessels, and road). The important assets are transhipment equipment and facilities for temporary storage of loading units. • Mode operators. They handle movement of the loading units between terminals by rail, IWT/sea, and/or road. Their assets are railway traction equipment, wagons, and vessels.
The roles of mode operators are complementary so that each actor contributes to the production of intermodal transport service.
In addition to these typical commercial actors, the supply side also includes public sector organisations:
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• Infrastructure managers. They are expected to make the best possible use of the existing infrastructure and to ensure that it is maintained in sufficient condition. The infrastructure managers assign capacity to the customers. Such capacity can be time slots on the rail. The availability is achieved by proper maintenance, traffic management, and investment. • Port authorities. They run the port area and develop services and facilities for transhipment, transport, and other logistics services. And, they assign capacity to their customers through mooring space/time at the berths. • Regional and local public authorities. They represent the spatial planning and regulation authorities. They can also be involved in the operation of freight villages and logistic parks, often with the motivation of promoting the intermodal transport.
Other important actors will be national or international public authorities (e.g. the European Commission) as well as NGOs.
7.4 Practical Steps Forward In order to enable practical implementation of the IMOD-X project conclusions, it will be necessary to organise a project addressing these issues. In that regard, the project partners propose the STRATIMOD project that will develop operative strategies for development of the intermodal terminals in Serbia and initiate practical implementation of the intermodal terminal in the area of Belgrade.
The STRATIMOD project will represent a logical follow-up of the IMOD-X project and the relation between the IMOD-X and STRATIMOD project is given on the following figure.
IMOD-X Project STRATIMOD Project
• Initial capacity building • Continuation of capacity • Development of the building knowledge of volume and • Development of operative type of transport flows strategies for development suitable for the intermodal of the intermodal terminals transport, macro locations and logistic centers for terminals and transport • Establishment of the market network of stakeholders • Development of general and initiating practical recommendations for implementation of the development of the ImT in intermodal terminal at Serbia Belgrade.
Figure 10.1. Relation between the IMOD-X and STRATIMOD project
One of the most important tasks in the STRATIMOD project will be to build the stakeholder network and develop common understanding and motivation among them for practical implementation of the intermodal terminal at Belgrade. The job on building this stakeholder network and development of common motivation has been started during the IMOD-X project and consultative meetings with some key stakeholders have
51 Status: Final been already conducted (e.g. Serbian Chamber of Commerce, SIEPA, and Belgrade Land Development Public Agency).
On these meetings, these stakeholders expressed great interest in practical development of the intermodal terminal and implementation approach of the STRATIMOD project. In addition, they also expressed strong support to the work of MoCI in the area of intermodal terminals and logistic centres development in Serbia. One actual concept of development is to build future intermodal terminals as a part of the logistic centres in Serbia. In this way, the logistic centres will provide customers with all logistic services on one place enabling them to do one-stop-shopping. This will also benefit local communities because the amount of city truck traffic and related pollution will significantly decrease. This development concept is in line with the latest developments in Europe in this area.
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8 Annex 1. Transport Networks in Serbia
Figure 1. Road network in Serbia
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Figure 2. Railway network in Serbia
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Figure 3. Inland waterway network in Serbia
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9 Annex 2. Ports in Serbia
Table 1. Equipment and main physical characteristics of the international ports in Serbia Water Berth Railway Storage Area Draught Main Ports River Area Length Line (ha) Equipment (m) (ha) (m) (m) open covered 3 covered overhead cranes, 10 quay cranes, container Belgrade Danube 4 10,4 940 12507 65 30 manipulator, 4 auto cranes, forklifts, tracks, trailers, etc. 3 quay cranes, 1 floating crane, 4 auto cranes, 2 Pancevo Danube 5 21,0 860 6100 10 4 tower cranes, forklifts, tracks, trailers, etc. 3 quay cranes, 2 floating Smederevo Danube 2 - 5 220,0 572 - 1,16 0,1 cranes, 2 auto cranes, and 1 forklift. 4 quay cranes, forklifts, Novi Sad Danube 4 - 10 12,0 800 6000 10 4,4 conveyor belt, pneumatic equipment, etc. 3 quay cranes, 3 covered Prahovo Danube - - 560 971 0,6 0,2 overhead cranes, 1 forklift, push-boat, etc.
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10 Annex 3. Macroeconomic Framework
Figure 1. The largest cities in Serbia
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Figure 2. Production volumes of processing industry in Serbia
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Figure 3. Population and industrial production
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11 Annex 4. Transport Strategy and Policy
Table 1. The goals, objectives and guidelines for development of intermodal transport Basic Strategy for the Intermodal traffic and transport Goals: • Progressive development of intermodal transport in compliance with the principle of sustainable development • Optimization of transport network by use of all available natural and infrastructural resources on the principle of intermodality • Extended use of new information technologies in transport Objectives: • Promote and encourage the intermodal transport use • Volume increase of 20% in intermodal transport • Action program for the intermodal transport to be made and applied within a year after Strategy and Policy adoption Guidelines: Preparation of the model of initial budgetary financial support of: • intermodal transport and potential investments programs for private investors or joint ventures • Complementary development policy with harmonized development of all transport modes • Fair determination of infrastructure and external costs to the public sector • Promotion of intermodal facilities as they become available Institutional framework Goals: • Unique regulator of intermodal and combined transport with unified functions of planning, management and financing with expert-profiled administrative staff • Commercial operators on free market Objectives: • TD and all relevant bodies and agencies are established, fully developed and apply their duties and powers Guidelines: • Delegation of regulatory function of intermodal transport into the scope of work of a new body for transport strategy and policy (MoCI) • Stimulation of the formation and development of intermodal transport operators by means of instruments of transport policies Legal framework Goals: • Complementary regulations – norms and practices • Legislative framework for competitiveness of operators in terminals and various modes Objectives: • To reach until 2010 EU countries regulatory practice from 2005 Guidelines: • Establishment of legal framework for the provision of equal conditions of the utilization of all transport modes • Ratification of international conventions and bilateral agreements on combined transport • Implementation of EU references and best practices • Implementation of international technical and safety norms • Establishment of fair business conditions on free market (suppression of monopoly) Infrastructure Goals: • Combining and upgrading of the existing infrastructure of all transport modes in an integrated multimodal transport network • Setting of new information technologies and facilities for transport, traffic and information flow management Objectives: • Establishing of facilities for basic intermodal transport network with priorities according the feasibility studies Guidelines: • Preparation of a study on the concept of intermodal network development • Revision of mode-based plans of infrastructure development and adaptation to a conceptual development of multimodal network • Preparation of plans of development of basic network of terminals for intermodal transport • Setting priorities for actions, bearing in mind actual availability of resources and anticipated (expected) transport flows Management Goals: • Competitive operators on free market Objectives: • Consistent realization of principles of free market is implemented • Modern management introduces the opportunities for significant intermodal transport increase Guidelines: • Strengthening of commercially and market oriented management and selection of professional expert- profiled staff • Selection of expert-profiled managerial staff, training and education • Establishment of business pools of operators from various transport modes • Development of clear marketing strategy with the purpose of promotion of combined transport and sales increase • Membership in different international and regional organizations and bodies • Joining the alliance of international operators for intermodal transport Source: Strategy and Policy of Transport Sector Development in Serbia, Draft, 2006
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