According to the Eurostat report published on Wednesday, internal waterways in the Union countries were transported according to the latest data (2023) 5 percent. all transport. Although his role is decreasing, because a year earlier it was 5.1 percent, and two years earlier 5.6 percent, it is still a substantial part of transport. It is cheaper and more ecological than road and rail.
The largest share of such transport is in the Netherlands, where in 2023 as much as 40.9 percent. The goods were transported by rivers. Bulgaria (22.3 percent), Romania (17.9 percent) and Belgium (10.7 percent) are in the following places. Germany also uses this path to a significant extent – 6.6 percent. In 2015, however, it was 9.2 percent, so other types of transport win on the market. However, this may result from limited capacity of water routes.
Increased its participation in transport, among others, the railway, which was transported in Germany by 20.6 percent. goods compared to 19 percent In 2015, however, land roads for road transport are leading.
Odra will start the topic of water transport?
And Poland? When it comes to the use of waterways, we are at the gray end with a result of 0.0 percent. There were episodic cases such as delivering to the Vistula weighing 850 tons of the Wash Tower column to the PKN Orlen factory in Płock for the already suspended investment of the Olefin III complex. Work was also underway on the construction of a waterway on the Odra to the planned container port in Świnoujście, which the carriers indicated as A condition for the success of the business port.
After temporary suspension of work, the case started again in August last year. and for the years 2025-2028 the construction of the trail on the Oder with a total length of 687 km got PLN 724 million in funding, including EUR 100 million from European funds. PLN 211 million went to the construction of a flap weir at the water level of the Nysa mouth, PLN 111 million for the modernization of the Gliwice Canal, and after PLN 201 million for modernization of the lock and control room at the water level Opole and at the water level of the Nysa mouth. However, there was a flood and repair work became a priority.
It wasn't until July 31, for example, a section of the Odrzańska Waterway from the mouth of Nysa Kłodzka to Oława. What shows the risk that is related to the water transport.
In January this year, Polish Waters declared their readiness to carry out work on the Oder Odra with investments of PLN 1 billion to 2028.
Poland high in the Union in rail transport
While we are the outsider of Europe in the use of waterways to transport goods, our situation in rail transport looks different. Although PKP Cargo has problems, until 2023 they were not visible and the share of rail transport in the years 2021-2023 grew in Poland from 22.3 to 24.1 percent.
This gives us the ninth place for 28 European countries, whose statistics were presented by Eurostat. Latvia had the largest share of railways in the transport of goods and in 2023 44 percent, which means a clear decrease compared to 2015 (79.8 percent). Over 30 percent The goods are carried by iron roads: Lithuania (39.1 percent), Switzerland (34.3 percent), Slovakia (30.4 percent) and Slovenia (30.2 percent).
