Deregulation of Freight Transport : Report of the Eighty-Fourth Round Table on Transport Economics Held in Paris on 1-2 February 1990

136 Pages·1991·2.179 MB·English

by  OECD

ECONOMIC RESEARCH CENTRE
EUROPEAN CONFERENCE OF MINISTERS OF TRANSPORT
PARIS 1991
ECONOMIC RESEARCH CENTRE
REPORT OF THE
EIGHTY-FOURTH ROUND TABLE
ON TRANSPORT ECONOMICS
held in Paris on 1st-2nd February 1990
on the following topic:
DEREGULATION
OF FREIGHT TRANSPORT
EUROPEAN CONFERENCE OF MINISTERS OF TRANSPORT
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
FRANCE
BERNADET, M(cid:9) 5
ITALY
BOLOGNA, S(cid:9) (cid:9) ........ 41
GERMANY
SEIDENFUS, H. St(cid:9) 63
SUMMARY OF DISCUSSIONS
(Round Table debate on reports) (cid:9) 113
LIST OF PARTICIPANTS (cid:9) 129
ECMT - ECONOMIC RESEARCH CENTRE
Forthcoming publications ....,, (cid:9) 133
ALSO AVAILABLE
ECMT
Prospects for East-West European Transport (1991)
(75 91 02 1) ISBN 92-821-1153-9 FF350 £42.00 US$74.00 DM136
ECMT- Round Tables
80th - Systems of Road Infrastructure Cost Coverage (1990)
(75 89 12 1) ISBN 92-821-1144-X FF130 £16.00 US$28.00 DM54
81st - Private and Public Investment in Transport (1990)
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82nd - Promoting Regional Transport (1990)
(75 90 05 1) ISBN 92-821-1149-0 FF80 £10.00 US$17.00 DM32
83rd - The Role ofthe State in a Deregulated Transport Market (1991)
(75 90 09 1) ISBN 92-821-1151-2 FF135 £16.00 US$28.00 DM52
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FRANCE
Maurice BERNADET
Laboratoire d'Economie des Transports
MRASH
Lyons
France

SUMMARY
INTRODUCTION (cid:9) 9
1. DEREGULATION OF INLAND FREIGHT TRANSPORT IN
VARIOUS EUROPEAN COUNTRIES (cid:9) 10
1.1. Liberalisation in France (cid:9) 10
1.2. Liberalisation in the Netherlands (cid:9) 13
2. THE PROBLEM OF DEREGULATION AT EUROPEAN LEVEL (cid:9) 20
2.1. Access to markets (cid:9) 21
2.2. Harmonization of the conditions of cost formation (cid:9) 23
2.3. Liberalisation and harmonization: effects on modal split (cid:9) 25
3. LIMITATIONS OF ANY ANALYSIS OF COMPETITION IN TERMS
OF (DE)REGULATION (cid:9) 28
3.1. Limitations of the regulatory approach (cid:9) 28
3.2. The other factors in competition (cid:9) 30
3.3. A market segmentation approach (cid:9) 33
NOTES AND REFERENCES (cid:9) 36
Lyons, July 1989

INTRODUCTION
ECMT Round Table 62, held on 29th and 30th September 1983, was entitled
"Possibilities and limits ofregulation in transport policy". This title and thatofRound
Table 84 are almost symmetrical: regulation then, deregulation now.
Comparison ofthe two titles might leadone to think that between 1983 and 1990
there has been a radical change in dominant ideas and concepts: in 1983, attention
focusedonthejustificationforregulationpolicies, whichwerenotinthemselvescalled
into question, but which might need modifying; in 1990, the emphasis is on
deregulation, how it can best be implemented and what the consequences will be.
A closer look at Professor Baum's report to Round Table 62 and at the
conclusions reached at that time show, however, that such an interpretation would be
false: the report was largely devoted to a critique of regulation policy, refuting a
number ofobjections to liberalisation and presenting an outline ofandjustificationfor
a programme of deregulation. One of the conclusions of the Round Table reads as
follows: "It appears possible to direct transport policy even more effectively ... by
making deregulation a general goal". Thus, deregulation was already seriously being
considered in 1983, and our concerns today are not markedly different from those
expressed then.
We shall not adopt the same approach as that usedfor Round Table 62, since we
should on many points simply be repeating the same theoretical or factual arguments
and would arrive at similar conclusions. It seems more sensible to examine the
changes which have taken place since the early 1980s, to try and determine what
progress has been made on the path outlined in Round Table 62 and to analyse the
conditions under which progress has been made in some countries.
We shall seek to do this initially by examining the domestic regulations of the
main European countries.