OREANDA-NEWS. December 5, 2008. Governor Yury Yevdokimov has appealed First Deputy Prime Minister Viktor Zubkov to lower prices on railroad transport of fish products.

According to a press release from the Murmansk Oblast government, Murmansk Governor Yury Yevdokimov has sent a letter to First Deputy Prime Minister Viktor Zubkov where he asks that the necessary steps should be taken to lower the prices on transport of fish products by railroad within Russia.

In the last years transport of fish products from Murmansk has been carried out on trucks, as the amounts have been rather small - less than 200 000 tons per year. In 2009 this amount is expected to rise to over 320 000 tons. Yevdokimov says that it will be impossible to transport this amount of fish products within reasonable time only by trucks, and that railroad transport does not satisfy the fishery industry because of the high costs.

- It is expected that freight traffic of fish products through Murmansk port will increase considerably from January 1 2009. It is important that the fish products are unloaded and transported to other regions of Russia immediately. If all the freezing storage capacities in Murmansk are in use, vessels might have to wait for unloading for several days, Yevdokimov explains.