By Government of Russia Regulation dated 17.03.2014 No. 381-r a plan for promotion of competition in the field of port services was adopted.

Elaboration of the document was a part of measures on promotion of competition stipulated in the Government of Russia Regulation dated 28.12.2012 No. 2579-r, which included promotion of competition in the field of services offered by natural monopolies in the sea and river ports.

The plan is aimed at improvement of the Russian natural monopoly legislation concerning stevedore services in sea and river ports, in order to eliminate circumstances that limit the natural monopolies’ ability to operate in conditions of competitive market, which is justified from the economic point of view. In particular, it includes a set of steps directed at exclusion of operators of marine terminals providing berths for loading, unloading and storing cargo and operating in seaports with large competition at the market of stevedore services, from the register of natural monopolies.

It is worth mentioning, that at present the federal executive bodies are already implementing measures to stop excessive price regulation in seaport. The Federal Tariff Service (FTS) of Russia is taking steps not to apply price regulation in several seaports with a high level of competition at the markets of certain port services. For example, FSUE “Rosmorport” as a natural monopoly operating in Kaliningrad Seaport by order of FTS of Russia dated 26.03.2013 No. 53-t/2 was included into the list of organizations in that seaport, to which price regulation for services on loading, unloading and storage of cargo is not applied.

In the framework of tasks for deregulation of stevedore services market, the plan approved by the Government of Russia, also stipulated elaboration of procedure for implementation of projects for development of sea and river port infratsructure on the basis of state-private partnership.

The latter is a priority task for FSUE “Rosmorport” as it is a strategic enterprise in the field of marine transport. During ten years of successful work the enterprise has formed and keeps improving the mechanisms of cooperation with private investors. With their help the enterprise has implemented a number of investment projects in the form of capital investments into construction/reconstruction of seaport infrastructure facilities.

In opinion of FSUE ‘Rosmorport”, adoption of the Strategy for Sea Port Infrastructure Development of Russia up to 2030, the project of which has been elaborated by FSUE “Rosmorport” and approved at the meeting of the Marine Board under the Government of the Russian Federation, will provide a positive environment for the long-term plans on development of competition in the seaports adopted by the Government of Russia. The Strategy will become a fundamental base for definition of seaport development prospects in the long-term perspective, in order to satisfy the demands of the Russian economics, remove the existing limits and increase the investment attractiveness of Russian Seaports.