Canadian rail freight volume was up 4.7 percent in March

Statistics Canada reports increases in rail shipments of fuel oil, crude petroleum and agricultural products.

Statistics Canada announced that despite all the setbacks due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the country’s railways carried 33.2 million tonnes of merchandise in March, up 4.7% compared with the same month in 2019.

The Federal agency reports that 26.6 million tonnes of non-intermodal loadings (carloads) were carried, an increase of 5.5% from the same period in 2019. Fuel oil and crude petroleum loadings posted the largest gain, rising 39.1% to 1.9 million tonnes.

There were also considerable increases in loadings of some of agricultural products in March, in particular with respect to wheat (+21.5% or +405 000 tonnes), canola (51.0% or +397 000 tonnes) and fresh, chilled or dried vegetables (+73.5% or +189 000 tonnes).

Loadings of iron ores and concentrates fell 12.9% (-642 000 tonnes) and lockdown measures and travel restrictions resulted in a 35.4% drop (-108 000 tonnes) in jet fuel loadings.

The volume of intermodal freight loadings (those moved by containers) decreased 4.0% to 3.1 million tonnes, compared with the same period in 2019.

Freight traffic from US rail connections rose 6.6% to 3.6 million tonnes in March 2020.