First of all, let me define northern Europe: Norway, Sweden, Finland and Denmark are considered to be Scandinavia while Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania are called the Baltic countries.

Viking Line serves mainly Stockholm (Sweden) and Helsinki (Finland). Thats a quick trip, yes.

Cruising Scandinavia and Baltics

The Nordic countries have often been a hotbed where the international freight industry has tested innovative developments. A fleet of airlines headed for Sweden, Norway, Finland and Denmark, attracted not by the tiny passenger market but by the huge global potential of the freight transport market.More recently there has been a slowdown in the air freight market as customers switch to road transport for their freight forwarding. Shipping companies have increasingly taken advantage of Europe’s highly developed road network. RailPort Scandinavia is a means of facilitating logistics, reducing costs and increasing capacity, thus improving the overall quality of freight services for the customer.This is the latest initiative in a successful Swedish rail freight strategy introduced in 2001 with the launch of two daily container shuttle trains that saw 110,000 teu transported in its first year. In 2007, that had increased to 340,000 teu, saving an estimated 42,000 tons of carbon dioxide emissions.The port of Gothenburg now has 70 train departures a day of which 46 are operated for the oil, petroleum, chemical, paper and steel industries and the remaining 24 are container shuttles.The port of Gothenburg started its box shuttles with just four train operators but now has ten rail companies – a testament to the success of Sweden having deregulated their rail industry and its impact on freight forwarding.The Gothenburg strategy provides freight shuttle links to six Swedish ports. Freight forwarding carriers have invested in the state of the art cold storage facilities needed to keep the products fresh. In this aspect of freight services too, Scandinavia is leading the way.