24 May 2007
Last month in Austria at Krems, took place the Constantza Port Day, event organized by the N.C. Maritime Ports Administration S.A. Constantza (N.C. M.P.A. S.A.). The Port of Constantza, through its position and opportunities, facilitates the services between Asia and the Black Sea with the possibility of direct transshipment from sea vessels to barges and vice-versa. The Romanian maritime port offers important infrastructure facilities for the barge traffic.
A comparison with the Adriatic and Mediteranean ports shows that the Port of Constantza holds undoubted advantages. The transport from Central Europe towards Far East, on the Danube, is more efficient because its shorter transit time. For example, a transport on Shanghai -Koper route lasts 43 days compared with Shanghai - Constantza which has a transit time between 23 and 30 days.
The shorter number of locks coming from Central Europe towards Constantza is another reason for the traffic development. From Constantza towards Budapest there are four locks, towards Linz 13 locks and towards Krems 9 locks. From Rotterdam towards Budapest the number of locks is 67, towards Linz - 58 locks and Krems - 62 locks. The traffic between the Port of Constantza and the ports of Austria has been growing with 23% compared with 2005, from 400,000 tons to 492,000 tons. The most important cargo types are iron ore, phosphate, cereals, metal products and coal.
Beside all this Danube traffic advantages, there is also the fact that the river transport is promoted by the EU policies, through the Transports White Paper, which is a document that promotes the inland transport rather than the road transport.
Source: APC