The traffic in the city of Warsaw was very heavy on Wednesday, March 22, due to a demonstration that gathered more than 300 industrial vehicles. The protest was organized by the Polish Road Transport Association, with the support of the political party Konfederacja, which has repeatedly called on the government to intervene in major problems affecting road transport in recent weeks. As the party’s spokesperson recently stated, the closure of vehicles is a reaction to the long-term destruction of the transportation industry, on which 6% of the national GDP depends and which provides more than a million jobs.
In fact, according to the protesters, Russian and Belarusian carriers are circumventing EU-imposed sanctions, while Ukrainian carriers are given unilateral privileges, forcing Polish carriers to face unfair competition and pushing many companies to bankruptcy. The proposal of the Konfederacja is to introduce a ban on the entry of semi-trailers registered in Belarus and Russia, in order to block companies established in the capitals of Minsk and Moscow, but also to extend the rules and requirements to Ukrainian vehicles as well, which are stationary. permits and at reduced rates. .
Therefore, the first months of 2023 were marked in Poland by a sharp drop in the demand for transport, which was connected with the uncontrolled competition leading to a drop. The expected spring recovery is still taking place, while the war and package Mobility operating costs have increased significantly, putting pressure on the resilience of carriers. According to estimates from Upply, one of the most popular financial transport search platforms, road transport rates have already decreased by 2.4% compared to the last quarter of 2022 and could lose between three and five points per year.
