TASS, April 27. As infrastructures develop, the Northern Sea Route (NSR) will be able to claim 10-15% of the Suez Canal traffic, which is about 2,000 ship calls a year, the Arkhangelsk Region's Governor's representative on the Arctic development Dmitry Yurkov said during the Znanie (Knowledge) educational marathon.

"The main task is to have integrated approaches and development of the Northern Sea Route. When digital technologies start working, the fleet and shippers will follow suit, and it will be the time when our entire economy will be developing. To us, this is a certain challenge to the Suez Canal. The Suez Canal nowadays has 18,000 ship calls [per year], and I think that for a start we can claim 10-15% [of these ship calls]," he said.

It is impossible to say now how much a voyage along the Northern Sea Route will cost in the future, he continued. "As yet, we can make estimations only very roughly. In long term only we will be able to see fully what countries and at what prices will be willing to cooperate with us. We have been working on types of cargo to make the route cost-effective."

The Northern Sea Route is a most promising global transport corridor. Experts say, as NSR develops, it may grow into an alternative to the Suez Canal, since NSR offers a faster access from Europe to the Pacific Region's countries. The Suez Canal's two-way transit serves about 12% of the world's cargo traffic. Up to 19,000 vessels sail along that route every year.

The Znanie (Knowledge) federal educational marathon ran in Moscow, Yekaterinburg, Arkhangelsk, Pyatigorsk and Lugansk on April 24-26. TASS was the event's general information partner.