The rising tension between Russia and Ukraine, which has an important place in Turkey's foreign trade in terms of volume, also echoed in the Turkish logistics industry.
UTIKAD Chairman of the Board Ayşem Ulusoy also evaluated the routes that can be used in the event of a possible war.
The fact that the tension between Russia and Ukraine has increased even more as of last night has caused concern in the Turkish logistics sector as well as in all other sectors. Although the Ukrainian-Russian borders are still actively open and the crossings continue normally, the decision of the Lugansk and Donetsk local governments to join Russia, the acceptance of these decisions by Russian President Vladimir Putin and signing the decrees again underlines the possibility of war in the region. he drew.
In addition, the Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs declared that it does not recognize Russia's decree. In the statement, it was also stated that Russia's stance is completely contrary to the issues of the Minsk Agreement and would mean Russia's withdrawal from the agreement.
Having a foreign trade volume of 2021 billion dollars with Russia in 27, Turkey also has a 6 billion dollars foreign trade volume with Ukraine, with which it cooperates especially in civil defense. How the political and commercial relations of our country with both countries will be affected will become clearer in the coming days. However, when we evaluate the current situation in the logistics sector, it is useful to bring up two issues first. The first of these is the situation of 'Civil Defense Logistics', where our country makes a significant difference worldwide. These and similar tensions and the possibility of war can really harm our country in terms of the service sector.
The other issue is that in case this tension turns into war, alternative routes should be determined immediately and necessary precautions should be taken for crossings on existing routes. If Georgia's Verhniy Lars Gate and Azerbaijan's Derbent Gate come to the fore as alternative routes, there will be problems in the long run. Because both gates will be insufficient for both technological infrastructure and vehicle waiting if the freight traffic shifts in this direction.
Considering that about 60-65% of our trade volume with Russia is provided through Ukraine, it is possible to experience very serious accumulations at these two gates. Here, it may be possible to extend the gates and transit times by at least 10 days. It would be beneficial not to ignore the possibility that freight rates will increase by 40-50 percent due to these problems.
Another alternative could be Ro-Ro flights between Russia and Turkey, which have been on the agenda for a long time. A Ro-Ro voyage between Turkey and Russia is reasonable in principle, but would also be much more convenient for both Georgia and Azerbaijan crossings.
However, Russia defines its own ports as container handling areas and wants to apply local container costs to TIRs. In the past years, negotiations were held between Russia and Turkey in this direction; Russia did not only show a suitable port for Ro-Ro voyages, the Ro-Ro project could not be implemented as the proposed ports were shared with container fields and the areas to be allocated were limited. Even in a normal period, Russia, which does not take kindly to Ro-Ro expeditions, will open its ports to trade in a possible war in the Black Sea, which is another question mark.
At this point, the last possible alternative would be to use Belarus and Poland as HUB. Although this transfer model is much more difficult and costly, it stands out for sustainable logistics services.
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