Congress of leading Russian logistics companies with participation of international guests, experts and the Ministry of Transport took place in the Russian Chamber of Commerce.

The event was held on the 17th of April in the Russian Chamber of Commerce building on Ilyinka Street. Its purposes were: revealing of logistics potential as a management system, which provides the use of new resources for Russia's economic growth; defining of logistics capabilities in the production and supply of new products, technologies, opening of the markets; consideration of areas and forms of cooperation and integration of business processes on the basis of logistics.
This is the first such event where the issues of logistics are discussed in complex, in conjunction with the problems of transport system development, according to Gennady Bessonov the secretary general of the Coordinating Council on Transsiberian Transportation, he also acted as a conference moderator.
"Such conferences are useful for the members of Russian logistics business community, - Miroslav Zolotarev, Head of ACEX Group, says, - here in formal and informal settings, you can ask your questions to the representatives of the authorities, who are governing our activities; communicate with counterparts and share experiences.
Every Russian freight forwarder nowadays acts at his own risk, and daily faces conducting logistics and customs operations in difficult conditions of our market - frequent changes in exchange rates; unstable legislation; lack of reliable partners, underdeveloped transport infrastructure in the regions."
Speakers said that Russia loses 6.5 trillion rubles each year due to failures in the transportation of goods and the high cost of transportations. About 20 percent of GDP is spent annually on transport and logistics (in China it is 15 percent, and in Europe - about 8 percent of GDP). There is very high demand for quality logistics in Russia today, this market is actively developing.
There are purely Russian nuances. Transportation by rail because of the high cost, low speed of delivery and payment terms is not fine. Result: automobile transportation carries cargos for distances up to 2.5 thousand km. It is profitable and faster to deliver cargos by aviation and railways on the distances over 800 km worldwide. We are chronically short of and warehouses and terminals. Russia invests 1.6 trillion rubles a year into infrastructure, and it's mostly state money.
It is definitely needed to attract private investors and to develop public-private partnerships, the participants of the conference said.

"At such meetings between representatives of authorities and business - Miroslav Zolotarev confirms - there is a possibility to draw attention to "hot spots" of Russian logistics, to offer a practical solution which comes from "the market itself, to try to generate lobbying ideas on governmental level. Wherever we participate, we try to draw attention to the necessity of developing the competitiveness of Russian local operators (freight forwarders, customs brokers, freight companies, warehouse operators), compared with the global multi-national integrators who occupy most of the volumes in Russian market now. It is very important now for market participants to form an understanding of necessity to consolidate various freight flows; to build logistics supply chains, to combine capabilities and experiences for entering the new international markets and expanding the competitiveness of the companies."
Chairman of the Russian Chamber of Commerce Committee responsible for logistics Oleg Dounaev, Vice-President of OAO "RZD" Salman Babaev, CEO of «Otto Group Russia» Martin Shearer, State Secretary, Minister of Transport of the Russian Federation Deputy Sergey Aristov and others spoke on the conference.
They discussed and analyzed: the possibility of the regional economies integration through the logistics with the use of information and communication infrastructure; federal and regional experience of interaction with business for the benefits of the formation of industrial logistics clusters, the role of logistics in development processes of distance trade; ways of forming a barrier-free environment for enhancement of efficiency of the interaction between the participants of the logistics services markets and optimizing of traffic flows in Eurasian communication.
Miroslav Zolotarev held a series of negotiations and meetings with representatives of the Russian Chamber of Commerce, RBC-research, STS Company, RSN journalists.
Data and photographs of the Chamber of Commerce press service were used in preparing the material.
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