Commission staff working document
: CHALLENGES FOR THE TRANSPORT SECTOR
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4: CHALLENGES FOR THE TRANSPORT SECTORThis section examines the main challenges, in terms of restructuring, faced by the transport sector in the coming years. This sector is one of the EU sectors that is most exposed to changes relating to climate change and changes in energy sourcing and use. Overall, the economic integration of Europe is set to continue over the next years and this, coupled with accelerated globalisation, will lead to increased momentum in transport activity. The transport sector is likely to restructure along two dimensions: integration at European and global level and decarbonisation. Failure to combine progress along these two dimensions will result in the European transport sector losing the technological leadership that it enjoys today, and failing to support the competitiveness of European businesses, with European logistics companies, which heavily rely on the excellent connections to world transport networks, likely to being affected in first place. Led by strong economic forces and policies, the EU is beginning to look, in terms of transport, like a continental, interconnected market, even if much remains to be done. While the integration of air and road transport systems is well advanced, rail and waterborne modes still suffer from numerous persisting regulatory, administrative and technical barriers which jeopardise their efficiency for cross-border transport. The transport sector is still very far from becoming a low-carbon system as it relies up to 95 % on oil. The Commission’s objective of decarbonisation of the transport system176 requires a substantial transformation of the sector although this is a long-term objective. A roadmap to achieve this objective has been proposed by the Commission in the Transport White Paper ‘Roadmap to a Single European Transport Area- Towards a competitive and resource efficient transport system’. The three basic elements of this strategy are the creation of a Single Transport Area, the promotion of new technologies and the completion and upgrading of European network infrastructure. Given the surrounding technological and economic uncertainty, it is likely that this path will have to be regularly readjusted in the future, in accordance with technological and economic realities. The decarbonisation objective implies that a gradual but significant restructuring of the sector is needed. Within this context, it is important to ensure that social cohesion is respected or enhanced during the process of restructuring. The White Paper expresses the willingness of the Commission ‘to align the competitiveness and the social agenda, building on social dialogue’. It is to be expected that the forecast growth in activity in the transport sector will help to make restructuring and social cohesion compatible. During the process of restructuring, it is crucial to raise the right expectations among entrepreneurs and investors about the future of European transport policies which shape the transport system of tommorow, given that expectations can attract or deter investments. The WP will build over many steps taken by the EU transport policy, thus the internal market is well advanced in the EU, with decisive steps having been taken recently. Railway freight market was opened to competition in 2007, international passenger rail market in 2010 and new rules for public transport procurement under Public Service Obligations (PSO) apply from December 2009. However, technical and regulatory barriers still effectively reduce competition on the Single Market and constitute obstacles to the provision of cross-border services. In aviation, Open Skies agreements with the USA and other countries are being concluded, increasing competition on the market for intercontinental travel. International road transport is also liberalised within the EU, while cabotage rules have been recently clarified. Maritime transport is open to competition according to international rules. Nevertheless, administrative barriers remain for intra-EU maritime transport, affecting the competitiveness of short sea shipping compared to land-based modes. Market integration is backed by the growing trans-European network and by a substantial regulatory ‘acquis’ both of which are far from being completed. All these measures take time to percolate into market realities, but the process is ongoing, not least because strong economic forces and actors are pushing in the direction of a low carbon, integrated and high quality mobility system by 2050. The main economic actors in a market economy are the firms. The current structure of the transport services sector includes a large volume of SMEs and individual operators, notably in road transport and inland waterways177. They share the market with a number of global giants and large European firms, whose activities cover different modes of transport and different countries. First among them are AP Moller-Maersk and Deutsche Post (DHL) which appear in the 2011 list of the FT global 500 largest companies by market capitalisation (ranking 194 and 424). A step that was to prove decisive concerning the integration of the European transport sector and its global projection has been taken over the past 20 years in the form of the process of liberalisation of national postal services. This triggered the creation of global transport and logistics giants such as DHL or TNT, which were acquired by the public mail services of Germany and the Netherlands, respectively. In this way, two pre-internet era communications firms positioned themselves as ‘just in time’ global delivery experts. This mention of the enterprise structure of the sector is necessary as neither consolidation nor restructuring takes place in a vacuum — both are first of all the responsibility of firms. The success of the co-modality concept (meaning the most efficient use of all transport modes on their own or in combination), the efficiency of multi-modal chains and the development and adoption of new technologies also depend on the decisions of companies reacting to market and policy incentives. Consolidation is needed to reap the economies of scale and scope that are made possible by a very large market. lf the European transport market appears at first sight to be highly fragmented along national lines, this is mostly due to the railways sector, the problems of which, concerning lack of interoperability and difficult access to some markets, are well-known. Table 6.1: Employment and number of companies operating in the transport sector, 2008, EU27 (1000 persons)
In addition the well-established regulated market opening, other integration drivers are at play. The enlargement of the EU has provided a relatively low-cost workforce, of which firms from the older Member States take advantage by establishing subsidiaries in the newer Member States, or by buying their transport services. In addition, globalisation has created a high level of activity, notably in seaports, where container terminals are largely internationalised. Further consolidation in all modes seems inevitable as a single European transport market continues to emerge in line with the Transport 2050 White Paper objective of full modal integration. Directory: pub -> ECD ECD -> Commission staff working document ECD -> Table of contents I instruments Error: Reference source not found ECD -> Table of annexes annex I: Glossary 4 ECD -> En commission of the european communities brussels, 12. 12. 2008 com(2008) 853 final annex annex II to VIII ECD -> Report from the commission to the european parliament and the council european community safa programme aggregated information report ECD -> Report from the commission european community safa programme ECD -> Commission of the european communities brussels, 24 2008 ECD -> Commission staff working document ECD -> Communication from the commission to the european parliament, the council, the european economic and social committee and the committee of the regions ECD -> Annex I iccat species Download 1.43 Mb. Share with your friends:
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