About 50% of freight cars in the inventory fleet of the Ukrzaliznytsia public railway company are due to be written off in the next 3-4 years. Yevhen Kravtsov, a board member of Ukrzaliznytsia and the company’s director of legal and property policy and reform, announced this, the Interfax Ukraine news agency reports.
"We are conducting an inventory and inspecting the fleet of universal cars, but the technical condition of many of them is such that they cannot be used," Kravtsov said during the presentation of 'Industry Survey" by the CFTS and Deloitte in Kyiv, on Tuesday, 1 March.
According to Kravtsov, a significant number of freight cars will not be suitable for use in the next year or two, and, because of this, Ukrzaliznytsia needs to decide what to do with a fleet that is turning into a scrap yard and what investment policy to implement in this respect in the short term.
"We expect a detailed dismantling of all such cars and not their sale entirely as scrap in order to maximize profits for the railroad. There is a difference between selling a car by weight as mixed scrap and dismantling it into its component parts. Of these, some can be sent to our own car repair enterprises in order to re-launch them into the production cycle. The rest will be sold as scrap metal for different prices," he said.
According to Kravtsov, this will require significantly more resources, but it will also generate significantly more money. "It only remains for us to obtain a decision of the Cabinet of Ministers on the procedure for disposing of property – a procedural document that is currently being considered by ministries. After that, I hope that this extensive program will be launched and that it will be successful," Kravtsov said.
In addition, representatives of businesses and the authorities discussed the shortage of freight cars during the presentation. Business representatives noted the surplus of cars as a result of the fall in the volume of transportation.
Minister of infrastructure Andrii Pyvovarskyi noted the big difference in the number of freight cars "on paper" and the number that are actually in working condition. "Already, one can write off a third of the cargo fleet…" the minister added.
The participants in the discussion raised the issue of investment in rolling stock by businesses. They all agreed that it is necessary to revoke the Cabinet of Ministers resolution No. 209, which does not allow equal access to the fleet of railcars and eliminates interest in investment in railcars by the businesses.
