Freight News, Rail

Sea-rail corridor to speed produce to market

[ April 14, 2016   //   Chris ]

French port Marseille Fos has launched a new sea/rail service to move Israeli produce to northern Europe under a European Union (EU) pilot project. Co-financed under the EU’s Connecting Europe facility, the Fresh Food Corridors pilot will run for two years until 2018 and also includes links from Slovenia and Italy involving the ports of Koper and Venice.  In each case, the goods are being shipped from Israel by exporter Mehadrin and forwarded by rail in reefer containers equipped with Genset diesel generators.

The France corridor opened on 12 April when Cosco’s Asiatic King arrived from Ashdod for discharge at the Fos 2XL Seayard container terminal. Following cargo sanitary inspection, the first train – operated by Eurorail – left the following evening with 34 containers for Rotterdam.

Including the scheduled 36-hour rail leg, the service will halve transit time from Israel to Rotterdam via Fos to just seven days – extending the shelf life of the goods by a week, and it also aims to cut transport costs, CO₂ emissions and road congestion.

Tags: Marseille