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FEATURES AND PROBLEMS OF TRANSPORT SECTOR IN BULGARIA. Final conference of project RITS Ljubljana 12th June 2012 Svetla Ruseva Union of the Employers Organizations in Road Transport (SOAT).
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FEATURES AND PROBLEMS OF TRANSPORT SECTOR IN BULGARIA Final conference of project RITS Ljubljana 12th June 2012 Svetla Ruseva Union of the Employers Organizations in Road Transport (SOAT) Project “RITS - Restructuring and Industrial Relations in the Transport Sector” is financially supported by European Commission. The sole responsibility for the content lies with the author. European Commission is not responsible for any use of the content.
Transport in figures • Transport, storage and communications generate around 13% of the gross value added in the country. • At the end of 2010 in the transport, storage and communications sector operated 19 084 companies, predominantly small. • The transport sector alone currently employs 73 466 persons. • In 2011 the Bulgariantransport system supported on a daily basis an average of 2.2 million passenger trips and thetransport of 278 thousand tones of freight.
Main features of Bulgarian transport sector • The transport sector in Bulgaria is highly competitive. • There is an increase in the total number of companies operating in the transport, compared to the pre-crisis 2008, with the largest growth being achieved by road freight companies. • The increase is due to the emerging micro companies, employing up to 9 persons, while the number of medium and large companies was reduced during the years of economic crisis. • The number of employees in the transport industry was reduced during the economic downturn by 13.9%. • Sales in the transport sector during the period 2008-2010 shrank by 21.4%, - land transport falling by 20.4% - water transport by 40.7% - airline transport by 1.8%
Bulgarian transport market • The transport services market in the country is to a great extent deregulated • The national legislation is harmonized with the EU legislation • Bulgaria has assured free access to all transport operators to various modes of transportinfrastructures, with the exception of the railway passenger transport
Sustainable development of Bulgarian transport – main objective of the sector
Sustainable development is about striking the right balance between economic development, social equity and environmental protection. • For the road transport industry, meeting this objective translates into the challenge of satisfying market demands at the lowest economic, social and environmental cost possible • Bulgaria accepted the IRU 3 "i" Strategy, based on Innovation, Incentives and Infrastructure
The 3 “i” Strategy • Innovation- to develop ever more effective "at-source" technical measures and operating practices to reduce environmental impact. • Incentives - to encourage faster introduction by transport operators of best available technology and practices • Infrastructure - without free-flowing traffic, the above measures are useless. Adequate investment in new infrastructure to remove bottlenecks and missing links, plus fullest use of existing infrastructure are essential.
TRANSPORT INFRASTRUCTURE - SIGNIFICANT PROBLEMS • Bulgaria has a high density road infrastructure with over 19 000 km. of roads, but only 480 km. of them highway roads. • Under construction currently are 296 km. of highways and 261 km. of high speed roads. • A second railway and road bridge over the Danube River is under construction too. • Weaknesses of the existing road infrastructure • It is not well developed especially in the suburban areas of large agglomerations. • The quality of the road network is not satisfactory, mainly because of the poor state ofrepair and the insufficiently developed network of highways and roadswith more than two lanes. • Insufficient infrastructure of bypass roads, as aresult of which motor vehicles traffic is passing through a large number of towns and cities. • Another problem stems out of the necessity, in line with the international commitments assumedby the state, to increase the load-carrying capacity of the pavements to 11.5 tones/axle along themain international transport destinations by 2014.
Consequences of the global downturn of economical activities in Bulgaria
Road freight transport in Bulgaria • Over 50% of the road freight transport in Bulgaria is carried out on own account • The road freight transport in Bulgaria is used for transportation of goods to near and medium distances • The main international markets are the EU countries with a share of 71%, Turkey – 18%, followed by CEE countries – 8% and other countries – 3%. • A shift from transporting goods by railway and waterborne transportto road transport was observed in the last few years.
Freight carrying companies by the number of the trucks owned /October 2011/
Road passenger transport in Bulgaria • Road passenger transport in Bulgaria is mostly used to cover short distances. • Road passenger transport entered into the economic crisis in the first quarter of 2009. • Atendency has emerged during the last several years towards a decline in the travels by publictransport between towns as well as a decline in the demand for interurban transport of passengers by public transport. • The quality of services provided by the bus operators in the sector ofsuburban transport services is inadequate in terms of availability, frequency andreliability. • Currently 53.2% of all the road passenger companies operate only on the domestic market.
Influence of the economic downturn over the companies in passengers transport Decrease in the number of the trips, and the number of passengers – 60% Shift in the passengers preferences towards the cheaper railway transport Increase of the competition of the low cost air companies Closure of international buss lines Decrease of the frequency of the existing international lines
Problems of the transport sector • The introduction of the EU road transport rules, for instance limits on driving time as well as the increased wages, lead to a sharp increase in labor costs. • The drop in freight demand and the drop in transport services` prices, especially on the domestic market, along with the increased competition and the higher labor costs reduced the return on revenue. This lead many of the companies to a bankruptcy, but even much more, mostly small companies, emerged. • The low demand for freight transport services. For example in January 2012 63% of the total number of Bulgarian trucks did not meet demand for transport services.
Significant problem is the high level of empty mileage runs, which worsens the utilization rate of mileage. • A major concern is the outflow of drivers to other EU states, as well as the low level of foreign language knowledge of the drivers. • The economic downturn and the reduction of the return on revenue stopped the investments in new vehicles and innovations • Delayed payments of the transport services • The sustainable developmentof transport includes traffic safety, which is a major problem in Bulgaria
Traffic safety • The number of traffic accident deaths from 2000 till 2010were9852 people and 90690 were wounded • During 2011 due to the increasing number of road accidents around775people were killed and 8080 were wounded • traffic safety is a major source of concern, which implies the need toinitiate measures for reduction of the human casualties and the economic and material damages • Our government adopted National traffic safety strategy, aiming to reduce the traffic accident deaths and the number of the wounded by 50% till 2020, compared to 2010
Main issues for future development Achieving the goals of the White paper • Increase of quality of transport services • Traffic safety development needs a systematical approach /infrastructure modernization, obligatory professional competence training of drivers and managers, strengthening of the state control activities / • to lower, as much as possible, its environmental footprint notably through increased fuel-efficiency and noise reduction.
Thank you for your attention! Project “RITS - Restructuring and Industrial Relations in the Transport Sector” is financially supported by European Commission. The sole responsibility for the content lies with the author. European Commission is not responsible for any use of the content.
