In January 2018 Russian Railways loaded 103.5 mn tons of cargo, up 3.5% year-on-year, but down 6.1% compared to December 2016. Loading of most cargo types in January declined month-on-month, but for chemicals and soda, which grew 4.3%.
Compared to January 2016, coal loading was down 1.1% to 31 mn tons, oil and products declined 2.5% to 20.7 mn tons, coke was down 3.8% to 0.903 mn tons, and ferrous metals scrap dropped 17.8% to 0.659 mn tons.
Loading of other cargoes grew in January year-on-year.
Thus, ferrous and manganese ore was up 4.3% to 9.2 mn tons. Chemical and mineral fertilizers grew 6.3% to 5.2 mn tons, timber and logs grew 5.8% to 3.4 mn tons, grain loading surged 36.6% to 2.2 mn tons.
Construction cargo loading was up 13.3% to 8.8 mn tons, chemicals and soda up 2.7% to 2.4 mn tons, industrial and forming materials up 5.6% to 2.8 mn tons, and ferrous metals up 10.5% to 6.6 mn tons.
Non-ferrous ore and raw sulfur loading remained on the previous year’s level at 1.6 mn tons.