April 13 - Transcontainer and Ruscon - two divisions of the GCS Group - are taking part in a year-long project to transport machinery via the Black Sea port of Novorossiysk for a thermal power station being built in Harta, Iraq.
The machinery is sourced from production plants throughout Russia, and Trancontainer acts as the agent for Sarjak Container Lines, which has been contracted to ship the cargo to the port of Umm Qasr.
Ruscon operates the off-dock terminal, which will provide stuffing and port handling for the cargo, consisting of 100 flatrack and open-top containers that will be transported for the project.
Pavel Merinov, head of Trancontainer's project and out-of-gauge cargo (OOG) team, explained that the company had been involved in a growing OOG export business driven by the Russian currency depreciation over the past year.
"The fall of the ruble has made our manufacturers more competitive in international markets, so we are seeing growing volumes of exports - to Asia, Africa and South America, which creates new opportunities for OOG shipments in specialised containers out of Russia," said Merinov.
