Russian coal miners solve problems with export logistics via Northwest, railway discounts no longer needed - RZD

MOSCOW. Jan 26 (Interfax) - Russian Railways (RZD) saw a significant increase in coal shipments to ports in Russia's Northwest, the company's deputy CEO, Alexei Shilo told reporters.

RZD has seen "very active" coal shipments to Russian ports in the Northwest since the end of 2022, and "this trend is continuing - in January we're hauling 32.9%, almost 33% more coal to ports in the Northwest compared to January last year," Shilo said.

Coal companies have done a great deal of work and in the third and fourth quarters of 2022 they managed to solve logistics difficulties related to finding vessels and selecting optimal delivery points, he said.

"Beginning in October [2022] we saw that the October Railway's loading of coal to ports started to recover. I can say that now for January we have all ports operating at capacity for coal handling. In other words, virtually all companies, particularly large companies managed to find new customers and managed to agree on delivery prices for their products," Shilo said.

He said coal companies do not need additional incentives to ship through the Northwest. "Based on how volumes are growing, we can certainly say, and we said this before, that our discount is not some decisive factor for organizing such logistics. Now the figures themselves already show that such support is not needed, coal companies are managing to ship out these volumes very well today," Shilo said.