Rates for rail transportation in the direction “Russia – China” from mid-May to mid-June increased by an average of $3,000 per FEU. This was stated at an industry webinar by the production director of Novelco, Victoria Vlasova. Moreover, prices are rewritten every three days, the expert emphasized, adding that the standard practice for the market is to update prices once a month or once a week at most.
The expert attributes this increase in cost to the low turnover of containers. On the Russian side, there is an excess of empty equipment due to the growing imbalance of exports and imports from China.
Another trend is the growth of transit time for delivery from China by rail from 4 to 11 days, the speaker added. The reason is the shortage of container platforms on the Russian side. “When a train from China arrives at the border crossing, containers need to be reloaded onto container platforms of the Russian gauge. But since exports to China are negligible, we can stand waiting for container platforms for 4 days to a week or even a week and a half,” explained Victoria Vlasova. According to the expert, as of June 2024, no railway operator can give a client an exact transit time. It is also impossible to know the departure date of a train until the booking is confirmed by the operator. Let us recall that in 2024, transportation market participants are seeing a sharp increase in prices for imported container shipments from China by all modes of transport due to an acute shortage of empty containers in the country. According to Delo Group, spot freight rates have doubled since the beginning of 2024, and by about 50% in May.
Source:www.logirus.ru