OREANDA-NEWS. October 11, 2011. During a conference call from Moscow, Vladimir Yakunin, the President of Russian Railways, reported on the Company’s performance in the eight years since the Company was founded, reported the press-centre of Russian Railways.

In his report, he noted that Russian Railways was a major transportation company, accounting for 2% of Russia’s GDP and providing jobs to 1.5% of the country’s working population.

"During the period when we were restructuring the Company, we were able to continue consolidating the position of rail transport on the market, increasing its share in the country’s total freight turnover from 39.5% in 2004 to 43.2% in the first eight months of 2011 – and that includes pipelines," said Vladimir Yakunin.

Yakunin added that Russian Railways is one of the biggest taxpayers into Russia’s federal budget and many of the country’s regional budgets.

"In the last eight years, the Company Railways has shipped about 10 billion tons of freight. This figure could have been even higher, but growth is hindered by the uneven utilisation of the infrastructure and the limited through capacity on the main routes of the network, as well as by the irrational operation of privately-owned wagon fleets," stated the President of Russian Railways.

According to Yakunin, in order to improve the efficiency of rail transport, the conditions should be created to manage the freight car fleet in the new circumstances, including those arising as a result of the consolidation of parts of the carrier’s fleet.

"During a recent meeting at the Ministry of Economy, cargo owners agreed with our proposals on appropriate arrangements. We have to speed up the work on the new schemes in addition to the legal and tariff changes that we have already proposed to the competent regulatory authorities," said Vladimir Yakunin.