Ukraine and Romania will create a joint coordination center to accelerate the movement of vessels on Sulina

The decision to establish a coordination center was made at a meeting with representatives of the Ministry of Transport of Romania, the Lower Danube Administration AFDJ and the European Commission.

This was reported by the Sea Ports Administration of Ukraine.

The meeting was attended by State Secretary of the Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure of Romania Irinel Ionel Scriosteanu, Director General of AFDJ Angela-Stela Ivan, Director for Shipping Routes of AFDJ Bogdan Bike-Benuce, Public Manager of the Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure of Romania Ionut Petrescu, as well as the Head of the Solidarity Routes Team of the European Commission Alan Baron.

The Ukrainian side was represented by the management of the SE “USPA” and the Ministry of Agrarian Policy.

During the meeting, the parties familiarized themselves with the current plans of the Romanian side for the development of the Sulina Canal and discussed the possibilities of their synchronization with the needs of the Ukrainian Danube cluster.

The main topic of the meeting was increasing the throughput capacity of the Sulina Canal and reducing the waiting time of vessels.

As a result of the meeting, specific steps were agreed upon:

• to create a coordination center of the USPA and AFDJ for constant operational interaction and coordination of fleet movement;

• to increase the number of inspection groups of the Romanian customs and border services to ensure the possibility of simultaneously clearing a larger number of vessels;

• to pay attention to the continuation of the implementation of the “PRIMUS” project, to enable night passage of vessels through the Sulina Canal;

• to conduct joint trainings for Ukrainian and Romanian agents and customs brokers on clearance procedures in accordance with the rules of the Schengen zone;

• to jointly make maximum efforts to increase the throughput capacity of the canal and the number of vessels passing through the Sulina Canal.

Romanian colleagues drew attention to the appearance in the Ukrainian and Romanian information space of messages that “do not always fully reflect the real reasons for vessel delays.”USM previously reported that Sulina may be closed for two days due to bad weather: about 70 vessels are waiting at the roadstead.