Rosatom to help Belarusian exporters ship via Northern Sea Route
MINSK. Oct 16 (Interfax) - Rusatom Bel, the Belarusian division of Russian state corporation Rosatom, and Belarus's largest logistics operator, state company Beltamozhservice (BTS) have signed a memorandum on strategic cooperation that will help Belarusian exporters ship their goods along the Northern Sea Route (NSR).
"We are the largest logistics integrator. The signed agreement will make it possible to organize the physical movement of goods along the Northern Sea Route. This will make it possible to reduce the costs of the Belarusian side and open new markets. The NSR is the shortest transport corridor to the market of Southeast Asia," Rusatom Bel director Stanislav Levitsky was reported as saying by Belarus Today.
The memorandum, which was signed at the Belarusian Energy and Environment Forum in Minsk, is a "very important agreement, because it will make it possible to work out new logistics solutions with our strategic Russian partners and optimize the costs of Belarusian exporters to ship their goods to distant countries and through the CIS," BTS chief executive Dmitry Kovalenok said.
The potential scale of Belarusian cargo shipments along the NSR is not yet clear. "We did not talk about specific volumes. Everything will depend on Belarusian producers' interest in shipments. But in general this logistics solution will make it possible to meet all the needs of Belarusian companies," Kovalenok said.
BTS said at the end of September that the first cargo for shipment along the NSR had arrived at its transport and logistics center in the Belarusian city of Mogilev.
BTS announced a container service to ship exports and imports between Belarus and China using the infrastructure of the Northern Sea Route Corridor (NSRC) in July. As part of this project, an agreement was signed with the Arkhangelsk Commercial Seaport, under which the Belarusian company will offer the port's facilities to its main customers for transshipment of containerized cargo, metal products, equipment and machinery. It was said that, among other things, the port's terminals are prepared to handle more than 1 million tonnes of Belarusian potash per year.
In July-September 2024, BTS offered shipment of import and export cargo from Belarus to the Port of Arkhangelsk and onward along the NSRC to the Chinese ports of Tianjin, Shanghai, Qingdao and Nansha.
The NSRC project was initiated by Rosatom in 2019 in order to create a new offering on the international logistics services market for shipping cargo between Northwest Europe and East Asia through the Northern Sea Route.
