The Ukrainian Ministry of Infrastructure of Ukraine has announced that the approximate level of localization of production of locomotives, the purchase of which is being negotiated with the Alstom company (France), is 15%. According to the Parliamentary Committee on Economic Development’s deputy head Dmytro Kisilevskyi, this was stated in the Ukrainian Ministry of Infrastructure’s official response to his parliamentary information request, the CFTS portal reports.

"The French concern, Alstom, will deliver its trains to Spain with 80% localization but offers Ukraine 15% of local components," he said.

Kisilevskyi noted that recent media reports stated that Ukraine was preparing a contract for purchase of electric locomotives from Alstom. The document could be signed during French President Emmanuel Macron’s visit to Ukraine. Ukraine’s Ambassador to France Vadym Omelchenko has said that the contract provides for localization of production in Ukraine.

It was reported on 30 March that Alstom would supply 152 X'Trapolis electric trains to the Spanish national railway operator, Renfe, with 80% production localization. This means that the French company will purchase more than 80% of the components for these trains from Spanish enterprises.

"Ukraine has a full-fledged industry for production of railways. It does not currently produce its own freight locomotives, but, according to the Federation of Employers, it is capable of ensuring 50-55% localization of imported locomotives, with subsequent increase of this indicator within 2-3 years," Kisilevskyi said.

According to him, localization of production of locomotives in Ukraine can be performed by both private companies (the Kryukov Railcar Building Works and the Mykolaiv locomotive repair plant) and state companies (the Lviv locomotive repair plant, the Zaporizhia electric locomotive repair plant, the Poltava diesel locomotive repair plant, and the Dniprovskyi electric locomotive plant).

"Ukrainian railway manufacturers are probably going through the worst period since Ukraine attained independence. For example, at the Kryukov Railcar Building Works, which is the industry’s flagship, only 70 freight cars were produced in January-February. These are more than six times fewer than the number it produced in January-February last year. In general, according to the State Statistics Service, production of freight cars and platforms in Ukraine fell by 75% or four-fold to 184 in January-February 2021, compared with January-February 2020," he said.