Ukrainian agricultural businesses ask Poland to build broad-gauge railway from Ukraine to Gdansk via Lithuania

MOSCOW. Oct 28 (Interfax) - The Ukrainian agrarians have asked the authorities of Poland to lay a broad-gauge railway line (1,520mm gauge) via the country to link the Polish port of Gdansk with the Ukrainian and Lithuanian railroad networks for exporting agricultural products and ensuring strategically important imports across western Ukrainian borders.

The respective request was filed to Polish President Andrzej Duda and Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki by leading Ukrainian agricultural associations, namely, the All-Ukrainian Agricultural Rada (UAR), the Agrarian Union of Ukraine, the Ukrainian Agricultural Business Club, the All-Ukrainian Association of Communities, the Ukrainian Union of Poultry Farmers and the Ukrainian Agricultural Confederation, the Ukrainian media reported on Friday, citing the UAR website.

According to the request, one of the largest and closest European ports to Ukraine is the port of Klaipeda, Lithuania, which has a substantial available transshipment capacity. However due to the difference in gauges between Poland, Ukraine and the Baltic countries there is a need to overload the content of wagons at the border crossings between the countries or relocate wagon carts, which does not allow for the full implementation of the export and import potential of the port of Klaipeda.

In turn, the use of trucks or containers as an alternative to rail transport is unsuitable for the transportation of bulk cargoes (coal, ore, grain, and metal) at large distances and increases their cost to an uncompetitive level. Additionally, if container terminals are used, the capacity of the rail line will be limited by their capacity, which will also not allow for the full use of the potential.

"In our opinion, laying a railroad line with a gauge of 1,520 millimeters across the territory of the Republic of Poland, which will connect the Ukrainian and Lithuanian railroad networks, and link them to the port of Gdansk for cargo and passenger transportation, can solve the aforementioned problems," Ukrainian farmers said in their request.

At the same time, this logistics route will yield substantial positive financial and economic effects for Poland and Ukraine, not only due to the increase of their export and import capacity, but also due to the unification of the economic space of Poland, the Baltic countries and Ukraine, it said.

This project could be implemented by reconstructing the existing railway network and constructing a joint track, or by building a separate railway line.

As reported in June 2022, Polish Deputy Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski said that the issue of building this broad-gauge rail track had already been preliminarily approved by the Polish and Ukrainian governments.

In early June, the UAR has already proposed the construction of 300 kilometers of broad-gauge rail tracks across Poland for direct grain shipments to the Lithuanian port of Klaipeda, which would allow for not overloading the content of wagons at the Ukrainian-Polish and Polish-Lithuanian border crossings due to the difference in rail gauges in these countries.