FRENCH COUNCIL PRESIDENCY RAIL WEEK
On 21 February, the European Railway Summit, organised by SNCF, took place in the framework of the French Presidency of the Council of the European Union, entitled “Rail, the Driver for Greener and More Innovative Transport”. This high-level conference brought together European and national policy makers, as well as representatives of the rail sector, to identify courses of action and concrete commitments around three key topics: decarbonisation, digitalisation & innovation, as well as the financing of the rail system.
The conference marked the official closing of the European Year of Rail and served as the opportunity to launch the Europe’s Rail programme, the successor of Shift2Rail. Nicolette van der Jagt, Director General of CLECAT spoke at the closing ceremony, focusing on the highlights of the European Year of Rail, and the vision of the freight forwarding industry on how to improve the rail freight sector for Europe.
Additionally, on 24 February, the French Presidency of the Council organised a symposium on the Best Practices in Support of Freight Services, which was attended by CLECAT. The event gathered high-level experts and ministry representatives from European Member States who shared their experiences regarding best practices and the best support mechanisms to face the challenges of decarbonising transport and economic competitiveness in the rail freight sector. As part of that, panellists addressed how the rail freight sector we achieve the objectives of modal shift in a liberalised market, how to develop the performance of cross-border rail freight flows, as well as innovation in rail freight.