Rail freight transport was confronted with several crises in the year under review: the crisis in Ukraine, the massive rise in energy prices, production cutbacks, material and delivery bottlenecks, and the high level of construction activity throughout Europe with numerous diversions. In addition, logistics flows were repeatedly interrupted by individual incidents (e.g. the blockade in Shanghai or the refinery outage in Schwechat) and had to be restored at great expense, explains Andreas Matthä, ÖBB CEO: "The railways have proven their supply and system relevance several times in 2022".
Since the beginning of the Ukrainian crisis, for example, RCG has organised new traffic flows and transported additional quantities of containers as well as grain from the Ukraine. In total, the ÖBB Rail Cargo Group has transported more than 1.2 million tonnes of grain from Ukraine - more than 100 trains per month and more than any other freight transport company in Europe. The company also contributed to ensuring Austria's supply of petrol, diesel and paraffin after the refinery accident in Schwechat.
Rail Cargo Austria's total revenue increased by 3% to EUR 1,999 million (previous year: EUR 1,933 million). At the same time, total expenses increased by 5% to EUR 1,964.3 million (2021: EUR 1,879.0 million). This was due to massive increases in energy, personnel and material costs. As a result, a pre-tax profit of EUR 7.3 million is forecast for 2022 (2021: EUR 121.6 million). However, this result includes value adjustments of around EUR 47 million, mainly due to the high interest rate level, as well as around EUR 24 million less government COVID support compared to 2021.
Not only the Rail Cargo Group, but also Rail Cargo Austria and Rail Cargo Hungaria achieved a positive result in each of their home markets. In Hungary, a single wagon subsidy was obtained.
The tonnage transported with RCG's own staff and locomotives - RCG buys about 75% of its traction services internationally from partners - fell by 6.4% from 94.1 million to 88.4 million tonnes in the year under review due to the slowing economy, RCG concluded in its report.
