In Spain there are 165,445 kilometers of roads managed by the State Road Network, the Autonomous Regions and the Provincial Councils, according to data from the Spanish Ministry of Transport, Mobility and Urban Agenda. To this we must add almost 490,000 km of roads under the responsibility of the local councils.
This very extensive road network - whose total length would go more than 16 times around Earth - allows people and goods to move from all points of the Peninsula, thereby ensuring the dynamism of the commercial activity in a country that is a leader in intra-EU fruit and vegetable exports. In fact, Eurostat data for 2020 reveal that Spain alone accounted for 31% of the total fruit and vegetable trade out of the 27 countries that make up the EU, and its leadership would not be possible without the key and strategic participation of the road transport sector, which is currently negotiating with the Government an improvement in the conditions of its thousands of workers.
Pedro Díaz, president of FROET.
"In Spain, a large majority of domestic freight traffic moves by road, as is also the case in Europe. Last year, 3.1 million tons of goods valued at 3.4 billion Euros left the Region of Murcia, making it the region's largest source of income," says Pedro Díaz, president of the Regional Federation of Transport Organizations and Companies of Murcia, FROET.
"In Murcia, our sector is almost exclusively devoted to the agricultural sector, and we have the largest refrigerated fleet in Spain at the single-province level. Quality transport is essential to get these perishable products in perfect condition throughout Europe, and it must adapt flexibly to the agricultural sector, whose production is subject to the influence of many factors, such as the weather," says Pedro Díaz.
"Considerable investments have been made in recent years to modernize the Murcian road transport fleet and it is currently one of the most modern in the whole country. We have Euro 6 vehicles which guarantee very low levels of pollution and feature state-of-the-art technology. With them, both we and our customers can control all the information about the loads at all times."
The Region of Murcia is the third largest exporter of fruit and vegetables in Spain, behind only Andalusia and the Region of Valencia. It should be recalled that a total of 12.3 million kilos of fruit and vegetables were shipped from Spanish fields, 93.5% of which went to the EU, mostly by road. And this applies not only to fruit and vegetable products.
The road transport sector, considered essential during the pandemic, operated without interruption, supplying the continent also with primary products such as medicines or masks in the first stages of this unprecedented health crisis, which highlights the importance of logistics. The sector also had to face a reduction in the profitability due to the lack of goods in the return trips to the Peninsula, which was not compensated with any type of governmental aid, says Pedro Díaz.
A very important sector, but also with big challenges
According to figures from the Ministry of Public Works provided by FROET, almost 3,800 transport companies operate in the Region of Murcia, with data up to September 2021. "Nationally there are more than 70,000 transport companies with an average of 2-3 vehicles per company, which gives an idea of how atomized the sector is. This makes it very difficult to negotiate with our shippers and pass on cost increases, such as the one we are seeing on diesel. Official data show that in just 12 months, from October 2020 to October 2021, diesel has become 32.9% more expensive, but in November and December the price has continued to rise," says the president of FROET.
Rising prices are not the only concern for the sector, which, despite its importance, is facing a severe shortage of professionals. "The problem is clear: mainly due to the conditions that we are not able to negotiate with our government, a driver's job is becoming very difficult. Young people want jobs that improve their quality of life, regardless of the economic factors." For this reason, Pedro says that the sector has been forced to organize protests in the face of obstacles that are suffocating this activity, which has already been described as essential for society.
"We have been negotiating the improvement of road transport conditions for 5 years now. In fact, an agreement was already signed last year with the previous Secretary of State after a strike that we were going to carry out in July was called off, but it hasn't been fulfilled, yet. We are only asking the Government to do what it promised," says Pedro Díaz.
For more information:
Pedro Díaz
FROET
Centro Integrado de Transportes de Murcia
Edificio FROET, s/n
30169 San Ginés, Murcia, Spain
www.froet.es
