EU – Baltic States, Forum, Latvia, Legislation, Port, Transport

Ivars Slokenbergs.

“Besides its strategic geographical position, the main reason for attracting investors to Latvian ports should be a clear mission and status of the Latvian Port Authorities set out in the ports legislation. The dual role of the port authorities on the one hand managing the infrastructure and monitoring operations, and on the other – actively providing services, is a principal conflict of interest that should be solved immediately. It is necessary to ensure fair competition and prevent potential misuse of the monopoly position of port authorities displacing competitors out of the market,” stated Ivars Slokenbergs.

AmCham informed the Prime Minister of Latvia, Minister of Transport and Chairman of the Saeima Economic Commission about the main conclusions drawn from the debate held on November 22 on sustainable development of transport industry and competitiveness of Latvian ports. The invited experts included Patrick Verhoeven, Secretary General of the European Sea Ports Organization (ESPO), Edgars Suna, Director of Marketing Department of Riga Free Port Authority; Marin Hili, Chairman of Hili Company Limited and Chairman of the Baltic Container Terminal and Arturs Spigulis, Attorney at Law and Partner at Spigulis & Kukainis Law Firm, who discussed how ports across Europe are developing and what forms of port management are chosen in various parts of Europe. In addition, they addressed both the major obstacles and benefits for investors to choose to operate in the Latvian ports. The entire video from the discussion is available online: http://www.veritweet.com/event/2194/AmCham.Outlook.11.2011.

At the AMcham's forum on Latvian ports.

AmCham President noted that regardless of the form of the port authority it is necessary to ensure transparency by clearly defining the mission of port authorities in the law and ensuring transparent decision-making. In accordance with the standards of good governance, port authorities should regularly publish not only the information on increasing cargo volumes, but also their financial statements.

The European Commission intends to pass the Ports Directive to harmonize the ports legislation across the European Union in 2013. Mr. Slokenbergs emphasized that Latvia should not hesitate and make an effort to develop new initiatives in the law already today.

“The Foreign Investors Council (FICIL) earlier this year sent a recommendation to the Latvian government about sustainable development of the Latvian transportation sector. We fully support the position calling to establish a shareholder ownership structure for “checks and balances”, transform the port authorities into private port enterprises that run port activities, establish additional board positions for representatives of companies working in the ports, establish a full taxation regime to private port enterprises with income distributed as dividends and consider IPO strategies and potential listing of shares on the stock exchange,” told Mr. Slokenbergs. 

“At the same time we would like to stress that any haste reforms should be avoided, instead there should be an open debate in order to achieve the best result for sustainable port development," proposed Ivars Slokenbergs.