General Director of FSUE “Rosmorport” Andrey Tarasenko took part in the extended session of the Marine Board Presidium under the Government of the Russian Federation, which took place on March 18, 2016 in Astrakhan.

During the meeting there were discussed organization of cruise routes in the Azov-Black Sea and Caspian Sea Basins, the development of International North–South Transport Corridor, as well as maintaining the Volga–Caspian Sea Shipping Channel  (VCSSC) in working condition.

As noted by the participants of the meeting, currently the main factor influencing the safety of navigation on this stretch of waterway is the falling level of the Caspian sea, which amounted to 98 cm from 2006 to 2013. In this regard, FSUE “Rosmorport” is forced to increase the annual amount of dredging for the shipping channel.

In 2016, in accordance with the plan of operation of FSUE “Rosmorport”, the total amount of dredging will be 5.8 million cbm. To optimize costs, the enterprise plans to perform works in the amount of 2.4 million cbm using its own fleet. In addition, 4 contracting agreements have been signed to perform the dredging in 2016.

The previous day, Andrey Tarasenko held a meeting with the top managers of the FSUE “Rosmorport” Astrakhan Branch and representatives of contracting organizations, where they discussed the results of the maintenance dredging on the VCSSC in 2015, the plan for 2016, as well as the environmental aspects of the works. 

Photo from Rosmorrechflot's website