Freight is a payment for cargo transportation by water. Freight also means provision of a whole vessel or its part for cargo transportation or performance of other works throughout one or several cruises.
In terms of geographical position, the freight market is divided into nine zones. Each zone has its own peculiarities – region development level, traffic density and volume, number of companies rendering transportation services, routes, specific nature of goods being transported; type of ships prevailing in a definite market zone is defined by these parameters.

As of today in the world there are about 27 thousand vessels capable of travelling by ocean. Their total deadweight varies from 1000 to 270000 tons, total tonnage is over 190 mln. gross registered tons and freight capacity 300 mln. tons of cargo.

The lion’s share of the cost of transportation services rendered refers to taxes, charges, duties and other deductions, which places Russian shipping companies in a critical situation comparing to competitors from open registry countries or countries having their own international registries. Russia draws up its own ship registry as the most acceptable way of support which does not require additional state financing.

More on Russian and international freight markets