Belarus has a network of river navigable routes with the length of about 2,000 km that connects the country with bordering states. Navigation routes are known to go along the rivers Sozh, Berezina, Dnepr, Pripyat, Neman, West Dvina and the Dnepr-Bug Canal.
The Water Transport enterprises provide design, building and repair of vessels, cargo transportation along the rivers of the Republic of Belarus. Besides, the enterprises of the branch produce wide range of products: launches, boats, waterside pontoons, 5-200 liter paint tanks and flexible concrete mats.
Their main tasks are considered to be (1) elaboration and carrying out the program of sea and inland transport development; (2) organization, formation, realization of economic and science and technical policy aimed at creation necessary conditions for effective work of sea and inland water transport enterprises, for satisfaction of national economy and population demands in cargo and passenger transportation; (3) ensuring optimal interaction between different types of transport and increasing transport export service.
Enterprises of the river fleet fully meet the needs in transportation of passengers by the water transport of the Republic. Passenger carriage is affected in the towns of Gomel, Brest, Pinsk, Mozyr, Grodno, Mogilev and Loev.
The river fleet of Belarus today includes modern speedy passenger ships of Polessye type (hydrofoil craft) with the capacity of 53 persons, suburban passenger ships, tug fleet, tugged cargo ships and special ships.
The port facilities are equipped with high-performance floating and portal cranes and mechanized cargo lines designed for fast handling of ships.
Ten river ports of the Republic of Belarus (Mikashevichi, Mogilev, Pinsk, Rechitsa, Vitebsk, Grodno, etc.) are capable of transporting and handling about 22 million tons of cargo. River ports of Gomel, Bobruysk, Brest and Mozyr have railway approach lines and can be used for handling of cargo transported in different directions.
Four waterway enterprises (Gomel, Pinsk, Mozyr, Bobruysk) maintain the required depth of the rivers for navigation of pushed and tugged rolls with the capacity up to 2,000 tons. They have the required bottom-deepening and excavation facilities, modern navigation sluices and hydraulic installations as well as navigation equipment.
The Republic of Belarus has 4 shipbuilding and repair plants (Pinsk, Rechitsa, Gomel, Petrikov) the capacity of which allows building new ships with the dead weight up to 3,000 tons of any class as well as repair of ships in operation.
Design of vessels and floating means are carried out at Republican National Unitary Enterprise Belsudoproekt (Gomel).
The control over technical conditions of vessels, certification of items used in shipbuilding is fulfilled by the Belarusian Inspection of River Register Republican Unitary Enterprise (Pinsk).
The control over fulfilling shipping rules in water ways, ensuring safe navigable conditions as well as holding of State Vessel Register are carried out by Belarusian River Navigation Inspection (Gomel).
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Transport forwarding companies Republican Unitary Enterprise Sea Belarusian Steam Navigation and Belarusian Navigable company, Belarusian Transport forwarding and Chartering Company working in the system of the Water Transport provide sea cargo transportation.
Although Belarus is an inland state, it strives to create its own sea trade fleet. Our government sees a lot of advantages in creating its national fleet. One of them is to create jobs for its citizens with maritime professions, another - it will be more convenient for Belarus to transport its production itself.
The year of 2004 saw significant efforts in the field of developing sea shipping in accordance with the instruction of the Belarusian president. The efforts are still underway. The appropriate treaty-legal base was drawn up for the sea shipping activities. In particular, the Inland Water Transport Code and the Commercial Navigation Code were adopted; intergovernmental agreements with Ukraine, Lithuania and Latvia were concluded on the development of inland navigation and transit shipping through ports.
The transport ministry of the Republic of Belarus already has a sea-shipping department. Simultaneously the Belarusian sea lines company is being setting up to carry out sea activities under the government's Program of Inland and Sea Water Transport Development till 2010, which was adopted back in 2003. Our own sea trade fleet expects at least two vessels of 25 thousand tons displacement to be either leased or bought. They enable sea transportation to be carried out under the Belarusian flag. Now the financial issues are being considered. As for the Navy development, the President stated Belarus to be considering "taking one surface ship and a submarine under Belarusian patronage."
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