photo: Archive/Archive/Andreas Mandl, LTE Group’s CEO: We are one European Union, but we have 27 opinions
RAILTARGET presents you with an exclusive interview with LTE Group’s CEO, Andreas Mandl. How’s the company operating given the war in Ukraine, and do they think the government’s support for railway freight transport is sufficient?
- I would like to ask you, what do you think about today's conference and the main topic?
Andreas Mandl: I think it's very important to have this conference, first of all, to see each other personally again after two years, more or less. And the second thing is, we are summarizing the topics, we follow the targets we are given by politics, by GreenDeal whatsoever, so it is summarizing all the facts, all the figures... Maybe we can create some measures, and I am glad to be here.
- Perfect! My next question will be about LTE Group. What about LTE Group and transportation during the war in Ukraine?
Andreas Mandl: Yeah, this has two sides. First of all, due to the war, we lost some transport we had before directly with the Ukrainian State Railways. We were transporting, for example, agricultural goods - Ukraine is very important for grain export - and these transports are more or less lost at the moment. On the other side, there was transport with chemical goods, for example, coming from Ukraine, and all these factories are closed now, so this transport has switched to European factories. So, on one side, we lose transport, and on the other side, we gain transport.
- And my last question will be about railway support. I mean, rail support of cargo transport by railway. What do you think about it? Is it enough to support what railway freight transport gets from governments in the EU?
Andreas Mandl: Well, I think it was said in some presentation, we are one European Union, but we have 27 opinions and also 27 solutions for technical problems, so we are working on a common solution. It's poor at the moment. For example, English as a common language on railway transport - it could be very simple because English is known more or less by everybody, so this could be very easy, it's a quick and easy solution. These are some measures that are missing by the European Union. All these regulations about the TTC, all the technical measures we have to fulfil, from my point of view, it's absolutely too much. We have also in LTE Group a locomotive workshop, and last week, I got some spare parts from Germany by a Polish truck, and the driver was from India, and he was talking in English. And I received my goods so why can't this work also on the rail?
- It's true. Enjoy this conference till the end and see you soon!
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