Working proactively

The Central Directorate for Terminal and Warehouse Complex Management of Russian Railways will receive new equipment made in Russia in 2022. This will help to eliminate the holding company's dependence on products of foreign machine builders in the unstable geopolitical situation.

This year, Russian Railways’ Central Directorate for Terminal and Warehouse Complex Management provides for the supply of Russian-made equipment, in particular, container gantry cranes, semi-trailers, gas fork-lift trucks, truck-mounted cranes and bucket (frontal) loaders for bulk cargoes. 

According to Alexei Belsky, Head of the Central Directorate for Terminal and Warehouse Complex Management of Russian Railways, the transition to domestic products was started back in 2020. The holding company's specialists monitored the technical equipment of freight yards and terminals and drew up requirements for equipment procurement.

"In this context we were prompted by the general epidemiological situation caused by COVID-19 virus. As early as at that time it was clear that with probable supply disruptions due to border closures, it was necessary to consider the possibility of purchasing domestic analogs of equipment to ensure the smooth operation of cargo yards," Alexey Belsky told "1520 International".

Bucket loaders were among the first items bought from Russian manufacturers last year. "In doing so, savings were obtained as compared with procurement of foreign-made products," noted Andrey Zybkin, Deputy Head for Commercial Issues of the Central Directorate for Terminal and Warehouse Complex Management of Russian Railways. The experience of purchasing Russian forklifts proved to be successful, and then Russian Railways expanded the technical requirements for purchasing other equipment as well.

The main mechanism for loading and unloading containers at cargo terminals of the Russian Railways’ network is a container gantry crane. The Central Directorate currently has sufficient quantity of this equipment, all of which is manufactured by Russian companies - Baltkran OJSC and Velikolukskiy Experimental Machine Building Plant JSC. Domestic truck-mounted cranes are also used, and the balance sheet of the Directorate includes truck cranes made by Russian companies (Chelyabinsk Mechanical Plant JSC, Galichsky Truck Crane Plant JSC, Avtokran Ivanovsky Machine Building Plant LLC). 

The Central Directorate’s fleet also includes domestic semi-trailers - container trucks produced by Russian companies NOVTRAK CJSC and Velikolukskiy Experimental Machine Building Plant JSC, which are used for transportation of containers.
It should be noted that in order to control the efficiency of the supplied equipment, Russian Railways regularly performs systemic post-investment monitoring. In particular, compliance with the main technical and economic indicators is checked on a monthly basis. 

"We highly appreciate the clients who have entrusted us with their cargo and we assure them of the reliability of our cooperation. Against the background of the unstable geopolitical situation, the Central Directorate operates in the normal mode according to schedules, and our services are rendered in full", - summarized Alexey Belsky. 

Sergei Volkov

26 may 2022