Truckers are raising transportation costs by at least 10% due to the fuel crisis in Russia

Russian road carriers have begun to warn customers about increasing tariffs by at least 10%, writes Kommersant with reference to market participants.

“Today we received notification from our fellow road carriers about an increase in tariffs: from July 1, they announced an increase of at least 10%. I can assume that this is not the limit,” said Tatyana Patuzhnaya, co-founder of the Sigma group of logistics and transport companies.

According to the founder of VIG Trans, Igor Rebelsky, rates for domestic transportation are still “relatively stable,” but “the prerequisites for their increase have been formed.” He noted that flight planning is complicated due to restrictions on refueling and disruptions in fuel supplies in the regions. And carriers include additional costs in rates, which have increased by about 5%.

The head of the logistics company Optimalog, Georgiy Vlastopulo, said that due to rising fuel costs over the past week and a half, freight road transport from China has risen in price by an average of $700 per flight. In addition, in the Chinese direction there is a decrease in daily mileage from 600–700 kilometers per day to 500 kilometers.

Pontis Expedition CEO Andrei Zelinsky said that carriers do not want to travel long distances due to the uncertainty of fuel availability at gas stations and “prefer orders within an urban agglomeration with a distance of 100–150 kilometers.” The NC Logistic company added that carriers either do not accept orders at all or significantly inflate the cost of transportation.

At the same time, there is generally no alternative to road transportation, note market participants interviewed by Kommersant. In their opinion, road transportation wins over the railway due to flexibility and delivery times, and since “the entire transport industry is faced with one problem, accordingly, there is nowhere for cargo to flow.”