“We are not too happy about this agreement between them, I will not deny that it would be better for us if there were certain tensions as we would feel more confident on the market then,” Algimantas Kondrusevičius, the president of the Lithuanian national road carriers’ association Linava, told the daily.
The Lithuanian haulers, warehouse operators and other businesses related with cargo transportation received more orders for the transportation of cargo from Western Europe to Russia since Poland and Russia failed to agree on permit quotas early in 2011. However, last week Poland’s and Russia’s negotiators agreed on an additional quota of 70,000 permits for Polish haulers for this year. Moreover, in 2013–2015 the Polish haulers will get twice more trilateral permits and the number of bilateral and transit permits will not be limited.
Some experts describe this agreement as liberalization of bilateral transport market. However, both Polish and Russian carriers warn that this compromise will also have negative effects – with more permits issued, the number of vehicles will increase, which will drive down the tariffs of cargo transportation to the East.
