Russia Business Directory

Transport sector in Russia has always been rather self-sufficient, with domestic production of vehicles and spare parts. However, the present production capacities in the related machine-building sector are rather obsolete, with the physical level of depreciation reaching 60-70%.

In the last years, the demand for modern vehicles has increased leading to increasing import and expansion of foreign car manufacturers in Russia.

According to the "Transport Strategy" developed by the Russian government in 2003 and to be implemented prior to 2020, the industry should undergo serious structural reforms, which will become possible thanks to solid governmental investments (annually 4% of the GNP).

More about various segments

Air Transport

Airports

Railways

Automotive

Road Construction

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General information
Ministry of Transport - official site (rus)
Facts and figures on transport in Russia (eng)
Russian Transport Guide (eng)
Russian Transport news (eng)
New East - Problems of transportation in Russia - articles (rus/eng)
Barents Euro-Arctic Transport Area - statistics, documents and some news (eng)
Sustainable Transport in the Barents Region - projects, documents and calls for tenders (eng)

Rostransnadzor - Federal Transport Supervision Agency, responsible for supervision of all transport activities in Russia, including certification of transport companies, issuing and withdrawal of licenses. The site contains a new section with information about withdrawal of licences, investigation of serious accidents, development of legislation drafts etc (ru)

Airlines
Russian Air Communication consists of about 411 airports, including 63 so called federal airports, but the physical depreciation of the airport network reaches 80%, according to the Russia's Federal Aviation Agency. There are plans underway to reconstruct the present airport network by creating several basic hubs throughout Russia. Another important issue is to make air travel affordable for common passengers. Though more and more Russians choose planes before trains, the air travel affordability index went down four times since 1990. As there are still quite a few regions in Russia which are accessible neither by train nor by highways, one should pay attention to development of small aircraft transport system, especially in Siberia and Far East.

By the end of 2006 there are registered about 180 airlines in Russia. 15 leading companies account for 85% of all passenger air traffic. However, the total number is going down due to numerous mergers and acquisitions. Russia's Federal Aviation Agency predicts that in a year or two there will be only 3-5 airlines operating international routes and about 10 on domestic interregional routes.

As for the aiports, the government is planning to establish a state-owned airport management company based in Sheremetyevo and consisting of 38 important airports throughout the country.

Rosaviatsia - Federal Aviation Agency, sector's supreme governmental body (rus).

Russian Airlines
Aeroflot – Russia’s biggest airlines, based in Sheremetyevo International Airport in Moscow. Domestic and international flights, regular flights to Oslo, Norway (eng)
S7 (former Sibir) – Russia’s second largest carrier (by traffic), based in Novosibirsk Oblast; operates domestic and international flights (eng)
Rossiya Airlines – state owned airlines based in St. Petersburg, Russia’s third largest airline by traffic. It operates both domestic and international flights as well as Pulkovo Airport in St.Petersburg. From 2006, former Pulkovo Airlines are a part of Rossiya Airlines (rus)
UTair – Russia’s largest helicopter airline, and of the world's fourth biggest helicopter operators, also operates a range network of airline services (eng/ger) Transaero – an airline based in Moscow; operates scheduled flights to more than 20 domestic and international destinations, with the main base in Domodedovo Airport, Moscow.
Vladivostok Avia – an airline based in the Russia’s Far East, with the base in Vladivostok. It operates 18 national and 9 international routes, and is Russia's biggest airlines in Siberia and Far East (rus)
KrasAir – an airline in Siberia, based in Krasnoyarsk. Operates several domestic routes, as well as flights to Southern Korea, Germany and China (rus)

Orion-X - NRCC Member Company, providing VIP charters in Russia and worldwide (rus)

All Russian Airlines - a list of all Russian airlines with links, logos and contact information (rus)

Airlines operating direct routes between Norway and Russia
Norwegian Air Shuttle - NRCC Member Company, Norwegian low budget airline carrier, operates several dozens of domestic and international routes, including flights Oslo-St.Petersburg and Oslo-Moscow (Domodedovo) (eng/nor/rus/ger)
Wideroe - Norwegian company based in the Northern Norway, operates domestic flights in Norway and a flight between Kirkenes and Murmansk (eng/nor)
Aeroflot - former Russia's monopoly, operating flight Oslo-Moscow (eng).
Aeroflot Nord – a state owned airline (old name "Arkhangelsk Airlines") based in Arkhangelsk, with regular flights from Arkahgenlsk/Murmansk to Tromso (eng)

Main airports
Sheremetyevo International Airport - Russia's main international airport, Moscow (eng)
Domodedovo Airport - airport in the south of Moscow (eng)
Pulkovo Airport - international airport of the city of St.Petersburg (eng)
Airport Murmansk - official site, with a rather limited English version providing just contact information and basic data. For schedules and updated information, view the Russian version (eng/rus)

Railways
Railways is one of the popular means of communication in Russia. By the length of railways, Russia holds 2nd position in the world, after the US, and the 1st position by the length of electric roads. However, thanks to competition from airlines offering both cheap tickets and a wide range of routes, more and more passengers prefer plane to railway especially on long distances. However, railway is still a preferred way of cargo transportation.

Russian railways are operated by Russian Railways, a 100% governmental owned monopoly:

• Accounts for over 3.6% of Russia’s GDP, handles around 80% of all transportation in Russia
• Handles 40% of all freight in Russia by turnover and over 41% of passenger rail transport
• Handles about 83% of all freight in Russia (excluding oil by pipeline)
• 1.3 billion passengers, 1.3 billion tons of freight annually
• 85,500 km of track (second only to the USA) covering Russia’s 11 time zones
• 1.2 million employees, 987 enterprises and 165 subsidiaries

Data source: Russian Railways

However, in 2005 the level of physical depreciation of the cars and coaches was close to 65%, locomotives - to 70-90%. Most railway stations need to be repaired and modernized, and the present quality of rails leaves much to be desired. During the last few years, the production of locomotives and related railway machinery in Russia has been increasing by 20-50% each year (depending on the type of the products) as the demand for new machinery is enormous. Experts predict the market for railway machinery in Russia will grow by 60% prior to 2010, while the world market - only by 25%.

Russian Railways - official website of Russia's railway monopoloy (eng)
Roszheldor - Federal Railway Agency, sector's supreme governmental body (rus)
Transmashholding - Russia's leading private-owned railway machine-buidling group of companies, incl diesel-locomotive shunters, main-line and electric industrial locomotives, passenger and freight cars, electric train cars, locomotive and marine diesels, car castings and other (eng)
Uralvagonzavod - state-owned enterprise, one of the leading producers of cars in Russia (eng)
Supply for Russian Railways - group of companies, most of them in the Ural Region, supplying Russian railways with spare parts (coaches, road elements etc) (rus)

Automotive

About 200 companies in Russia are producing spare parts for the automotive industry. The last years have seen expansion of several world's leading car makers into the Russian market, which are not only successfully selling their cars, but build car factories in various regions of Russia. Among them are Toyota, Nissan, Ford, General Motors etc.

National car and truck makers
Autovaz - Russia's leading car maker, producer of famous LADA (rus)
Kamaz - Russia's leading large vehicle maker and one of top 10 truck manufacturers in the world. Presently, it is a group of companies uniting 110 enterprises (eng)
GAZ Group - group of companies uniting 18 companies, hereunder:

• Gorky Automobile Plant (Nizhny Novgorod), Russia’s leading manufacturer of light commercial vehicles, trucks and cars. Brands: GAZel, Sobol, Valday, Sadko and Volga.
• Pavlovsky Bus Plant (Nizhny Novgorod region, Pavlovo), Russia’s leading producer of interurban, suburban and intercity buses under the PAZ brand.
• LDV Car Plant (Birmingham, UK) is a foreign manufacturer of MAXUS light commercial vehicles.
• Likino Bus Plant (Moscow region, Likino-Dulyovo), manufacturer of LiAZ buses.
• Avtodizel (Yaroslavl), Russia’s leading diesel engine and power unit manufacturer operating under the YaMZ brand.
• Ural Automobile Plant (Chelyabinsk region, Miass) is a manufacturer of URAL heavy on- and off-road and cargo trucks
• Tver Excavator Plant (Tver) is Russia’s largest producer of TvEX caterpillar and wheel excavators

AMO ZIL - one of Russia's leading truck producers, hereunder VIP-cars, low-tonnage and cross-country trucks, vans, road-building machinery, special purpose vehicles, car lifts, cranes etc. Also produces VIP-class cars under ZIL brand (eng)
Among other famous car makers, one should mention IzhMash-AVTO, UAZ, GM-Avtovaz, NevAz and Ford Motor.

Road Construction

Total length of Russian public roads (according to statistics of 01.01.2005) is close to 600.600 km, including approximately 47.100 thousand km of federal roads and 553.500 km of regional public roads. 546.400 km of roads are surfaced roads, among them 46.900 km of federal and 499.500 km of regional public roads.

There are about 5700 bridges on federal roads, and 37 400 bridges on regional roads. Sector employs about 1 million workers. (All data from Rosavtodor)

One of the major construction projects is a 659 km long Moscow-St Petersburg high-speed toll road to be finished by 2013. The new road should substitute the existing highway between the two cities which presently contains only two lanes and is called "death road".

For more information about the sector, you can visit the following websites:

Rosavtodor - Federal Road and Highway Agency, sector's supreme governmental body (eng)

Sea and River Transport

Rosmorflot - Federal Agency on Sea and River Transport (rus)

Logistics

According to the research of RBC Analytics Agency, more than 4 000 companies in Russia offer transport and cargo handling services. About 760 companies offer storehouses.

Post and shipment
Ministry of Informational Technologies and Communication of Russia  – official site (eng)
Russian Post (eng)
Russian Post news (eng)
Russian Communication Company (eng)
Russian communication market (eng)