After the suspension of production in the Coke Plant in Lukavac, the Ljubija Mine near Prijedor, and the Zenica Steelworks, both railway companies in Bosnia and Herzegovina were left without important clients and multi-million revenues. Railways of Republika Srpska, for example, have lost 60 percent of their income, according to their director.
Freight trains of Republika Srpska Railways no longer transport iron ore but scrap metal. There are also oil tanker trains on the tracks.
“We are transporting ore from Prijedor and clay to Italy, so there are trains. However, on a daily basis we had 4,500 tons of freight with five to six trains constantly. Now, we cannot easily compensate for the daily volume dispatched with just one, two, or three trains per week,” emphasized the Acting General Director of Republika Srpska Railways, Dragan Zelenković.
The aforementioned transports cannot replace the lost revenues following the shutdown of production in Lukavac, Prijedor, and Zenica.
“With the shutdown of the Coke Plant, we lost about five million BAM in annual revenue. With the shutdown of the Steelworks and the Mine, we suffered additional losses. Together with the Coke Plant and the Mine, 60 percent of our revenue came from that transport,” said Dragan Zelenković.
“The remaining goods are relatively small amounts for the needs of some private companies and operators. The Steelworks, the Mine, and the Coke Plant were our primary clients. With their shutdown, we have also reached a point of collapse,” said the President of the Independent Union of Train Drivers of ŽRS, Simo Cvjetković.
The liquidity of the company was previously jeopardized by the Government of Republika Srpska, which reduced the grant for the Railways from 20 to 10 million BAM three years ago.
“What the Government needs to show now is the will for the survival of the Railways in their current organization, meaning they should get involved as much as possible,” believes the President of the Railway Workers’ Union of RS, Jelenko Dobraš.
Even before the collapse of heavy industry, the revenues of the entity Railways were not enough for normal functioning.
Around 1,700 people are employed in the Railways of Republika Srpska. More than four million BAM is required just for the payment of salaries. The Railways of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina are also facing problems, and the Railways of RS are seeking a solution with them.
“We have an announcement regarding container traffic transport involving the Port of Ploče, Railways of the Federation, Railways of RS, as well as the Logistics Consortium of BiH,” points out the Vice President of the Independent Union of Transport and Traffic Activities, Goran Petković.
“We hope that some reason will prevail and that those strategic enterprises will come to life regardless of their ownership status, whether private or state-owned. We hope the economy will recover and the Railways will have freight to transport,” said the President of the Independent Union of Train Drivers of ŽRS, Simo Cvjetković.
The company’s management in Doboj is monitoring the Federal Government’s initiative to restart production at the Steelworks, while they also seek other solutions.
“The two strategic goals of ŽRS are to open the transit route Ploče – Central Europe and Ploče towards Eastern Europe. The second goal is to attempt to redirect the goods currently moving along Corridor 10 through Croatia to Route 9a, which is the corridor that enters at Dobrljin and exits at Zvornik,” states the Acting General Director of ŽRS, Dragan Zelenković.
It is certain that the transports the railway workers are currently hoping for cannot be realized quickly. Nearly 4,200 people are employed in both railway companies in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
