Le transport routier international est un des secteurs les plus affectés par les tensions géopolitiques: l’embargo Russe sur les marchandises en provenance de l’UE et la baisse du cours du rouble. Tous les transporteurs sont forcés d’admettre qu’au cours de l’année dernière, la part des transports vers et en provenance de la Russie ont gravement diminuées. Cela affecte surtout les transporteurs spécialisés dans le transport d’aliments, de fruits et légumes. Cette baisse a été également constatée sur le marché Ukrainien. Au même moment, tous les grands acteurs de l’industrie ont diversifié leur marché, ce qui a fait que la perte des marchés Russes et Ukrainiens a été difficile, mais pas fatale. Un autre problème du secteur du transport est la concurrence déloyale des entreprises appelées « one day existence » qui ont tendance à travailler en dessous des coûts de production, de faire faillite et de lancer un nouveau business. Enfin, il arrive également que certains clients malhonnêtes ne paient pas pour les prestations, annonçant leur insolvabilité. Car ce genre de situations frappent bien souvent sans prévenir.

Latvian freight sector is characterized by large-scale share of export services. Namely, their customers are not only Latvian, but also in other European Union (EU) countries, particularly in Scandinavia. Our corporate competitive advantage is the high quality of service at an affordable price. Sonora yearly increases it’s turnover, and 2015 was no exception. As per company’s board chairman Janis Mozga, the fall of the Russian and CIS market has taken place, but the company managed to offset with other countries’ markets, as well as with rail and maritime transports. Latvian customers’ share of the company is around 40%, and their cargo is mainly transported to Scandinavia, Germany and France. As pointed out by Mr Mozga, Latvian carrier’s main advantage is high quality and the ability to provide a full range of logistics services – from stevedoring and customs consulting services to cargo packing and consolidation, thereby reducing the number of units and the costs accordingly. « Competition in Latvian market is very fierce, so there are signs of dumping, separate companies uses it very actively. At the same time I believe that some spots in the market are still free, but on condition that the company is actively acquiring other logistics market services, such as the Scandinavian countries.

If we are talking about main sector problems in addition to dumping, Latvian entrepreneurs stress attention to get forwarders – carriers licensed. It would exclude situations where company in order to attract customers is offering services for unreasonably low rates, then goes bankrupt and re-establish a new company.
« In my opinion the main task of the sector is to introduce licensing and certification for International Freight Forwarders, thus raising the quality standards in the industry » admits Mr. Mozga. Other logistics carriers also agrees to the fact that such licensing would be useful.

Source: « Diena », by Ruta Kesnere, 08.02.2016

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