On June 26, Minsk /Olga Belyavskaya - BELTA/. The Ministry of Transport and Communications of Belarus is initiating reforms in the road sector of Belarus. This was announced today by the head of the ministry, Ivan Shcherbo, at a meeting of the Presidium of the Council of Ministers, according to a BELTA correspondent.
"It is proposed to carry out reforms in the road sector and do so in two stages," the minister noted. In the first stage, it is proposed to transfer the M-1/E30 Brest - Minsk - Russian Federation border highway from the economic management of RUP "Belavtostrada" to regional road administrations on a territorial basis. This measure will allow for the reduction of 6-8 road maintenance departments by merging them with similar structures in the regional enterprises of republican highways, reducing the costs of maintaining production bases, and improving interaction with regional executive committees. It is planned to create an enterprise - the owner of the national toll road system - on the basis of RUP "Belavtostrada". The Ministry of Transport also proposed to liquidate RUP "Beldorresursy", entrusting the functions of supplying main road construction materials to OJSC "Dorstroyindustriya".
In addition, it is planned to create a holding company of road construction organizations in Belarus, to which a package of shares in state-owned road construction enterprises will be transferred. The formation of a holding structure will significantly increase the importance of the road sector in international tenders and concentrate efforts on the country's most important construction projects. The mechanism for managing property within the holding will be significantly simplified, and issues of contractual relations will be resolved.
Ivan Shcherbo also proposed to assess the possibility of creating a targeted road fund in Belarus from January 1, 2014, and to work out sources for its funding. He voiced the idea of creating a unified technical supervision structure for all types of work on public roads.
The Minister added that approximately 80% of republican roads have exceeded the scheduled maintenance intervals for major repairs, with 9.9 thousand km of these roads not having undergone repairs for over 20 years. According to instrumental diagnostics conducted in 2011, only 1385 km of roads can withstand the European axle load of 11.5 tonnes without damage, 12.9 thousand km have an allowable load of 10 tonnes per axle, and 1304 km have a load of less than 10 tonnes. The scope of work for major and routine repairs on roads has significantly decreased in recent years. "The result of this situation has been numerous complaints about extensive pothole formation, its untimely elimination, and the violation of regulatory deadlines for snow removal and road clearing," stated Ivan Shcherbo. At some sites, regulatory construction timelines are not being met, and reconstruction is being delayed. Reforms should help resolve many of the accumulated problems in the sector.
BELTA