Railway services could be provided also by private operators in Moldova

Chisinau, 21 November /MOLDPRES/ - The government today approved a draft code of the railway transport, the implementation of which will remove the monopoly of the Railway of Moldova state enterprise on the railway services market. Thus, under the document, the railway infrastructure will continue to belong to the state, while the services of traction, transport of passengers and goods could be provided by private operators.   

The partial transposition of the directive of the European Parliament and European Council on the creation of the single European railway area, on railway safety, as well as other directives of European institutions is carried out by this draft.

Under the new code, railway transport operators will have right of access to the railway infrastructure based on a payment for the use of infrastructure. The payment will be established according to a methodology of calculation approved by the government. The goal of this payment is to cover the expenses for managing the infrastructure.

The railway transport operators will be able to provide railway transport services at a price set independently. To improve the competitiveness of the railway transport with other transport means, the tax of access to the railway infrastructure needs to be established at a minimum level possible. In this context, the government has obligation to intervene with subsidies, in order to finance a part of the costs of managing the infrastructure, the Economics and Infrastructure Ministry also said.    

Thus, decision-makers are willing to re-orient the flows of goods and passengers to the railway transport, which ensures a higher level of passengers’ safety and a lower impact on the environment.

The draft creates the needed legal basis also for the approval of the rules of railway carriage of passengers, which will establish strict rules as to the providing of passenger transport services, way of service, mechanism of compensation and other aspects dealing with the protection of consumers’ rights in this field. Operators due to provide these services are obliged to have a permissive act – Safety Certificate and infrastructure’s manager must have safety authorization.   

These permissive acts will be released by the Railway Authority, based on the assessment of the system of management of safety, elaborated and set by the solicitant, as well as the compliance with the specific requirements applied for the national infrastructure or for the a sector of this infrastructure.  

Presently, the railway transport of Moldova represents a branch organized as a closed system, in which a single entity provides transport services. The possibility of access of other operators to the railway infrastructure is excluded. The railway code in force sees that that “railway transport represents a natural monopoly.”    

The Economics and Infrastructure Ministry said that, given the lack of investments in infrastructure and rolling stock, concomitantly with the decrease in the flow of goods carried by train and the lack of subsidization of the railway passenger transport, the Railway of Moldova enterprise accumulated debts worth about 500 million lei. The maintaining of services and assets, which are not involved in the carrying out of railway transport activity, leads to the increase of costs and make annual losses worth about 100-200 million lei.

The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the European Investment Bank have earlier said that they would provide 55 million euros for the restoration of the Railways of Moldova.