The four words that best describe the rail freight challenges in the year 2022 are war, lockdowns, energy prices and construction works. We talked about these topics with four industry experts during the Year-End Webinar on Friday 16 December.

During the webinar, we talked with Frank Shao from Tiedada, Igor Tambaca from RailBridgeCargo, Aleksandrs Gnedov from Conway Container Solutions and Conor Feighan from the European Rail Freight Association.

War and lockdowns

War impacted the business a lot, but it also created new markets. For example India, which is really coming up as a rail freight market, agreed the participants. The Middle Corridor was developed, but customers also returned to the northern route in recent months. In general, traffic has seen an upward trend since summer again.

The lockdowns in China have impacted logistics, but there is now great relaxation of rules in the country. This is good news, as this means that production will speed up again and cargo volumes on the corridor will rise. The question remains if this will bring back congestion at bottlenecks.

Electricity prices and construction works

Railway operators are the largest single electricity customer in Europe, and their concerns about high energy prices are only partially heard at the European level. Some member states support the industry, most recently the German government has come forward with aid, but this is not the case in all countries.

Meanwhile, the TEN-T revision is approved, but it remains to be seen how it will be implemented. There is a strong focus on Ukraine and Moldova, while Poland has lost significant EU funding. Preparations are made for a new future.

We wished the audience a good year ahead with a toast. Did you miss it? You can watch the replay of this webinar below.