The volume of freight transportation by Ukrainian railways reduced by 19 million tons or 6.6% to 267.3 million tons in the period of January-August compared with the same period of last year, according to operational data. This was announced by Mykola Topchiev, the head of the analysis division at Ukrzaliznytsia’s main department of transportation, the press service of the Ministry of Infrastructure said.
The fall in the volume of freight transportation is due to, among other things, the destruction of the railway infrastructure in eastern Ukraine and the partial loss of the cargo base.
"The operations of the Debaltsevo and Nikitovka railway hubs have practically been paralyzed, and it is currently impossible to send freight cars from more than 50 major freight stations on the Donetsk Railway," Topchiev said.
Freight loading on the Donetsk Railway reduced threefold to 4.1 million tons in August because of the war in the Donbass industrial region. In particular, loading of the main railway cargo - coal - reduced 4.3-fold to 1.6 million tons in August.
As reported, Ukrzaliznytsia’s acting head Maksym Blank recently said that Ukrzaliznytsia lost UAH 1.5 billion in revenues (about 30% of its total revenue) in August.
