Arctic navigation routes include the ‘Northwest Passage’ between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans along the northern coast of North America and the ‘Northern Sea Route’ (NSR) which includes all passages along the North coast of the Russian Federation. As a result of the continued melting of Arctic sea ice a new ‘Central Arctic Ocean Route’ may soon become an option alone or in combination with elements of the Northwest Passage or the NSR.
Every time Arctic sea ice extent reaches a new record low a host of new reports and studies predict a rapid increase in shipping activities in the Arctic. Expectations are high that Arctic shipping routes, particularly the Northern Sea Route, will rival traditional shipping routes and complement the Suez Canal route as a key waterway for trade to and from Asia by the middle of this century. One of the drivers of Arctic shipping, as the logic goes, is China’s rapidly growing international trade. As China aims to diversify its trade routes and reduce its dependence on trade passing through the Strait of Malacca, the Arctic offers an alternative and shorter route to conduct part of its trade. How realistic are such scenarios?
Not so long ago, explorers risked their lives and the lives of their crews in search of the fabled Northwest Passage. Now the question is no longer if a route through the Arctic exists but how many ships will use the two routes now open each year along the northern coasts of Canada and Russia. Estimates for the possibility of making truly ice-free transits range from a few years to a few decades, but in the meantime, as evidenced by the hundreds of applications in 2012 and 2013 (495 successful applicants as of September 2013 to transit Russia’s Northern Sea Route, up from zero a mere five years ago), plenty of folks are willing to risk a little ice in pursuit of shorter shipping routes that were the goal of explorers since even before Lord Franklin’s famously lost expedition.
The following interview, exclusively published by Route Magazine, covers some very important and interesting aspects of Arctic affairs. Alexandre Latsa, French expert in geopolitics, author of “Putin’s New Russia” and RIA Novosti News Agency contributor, analyzes the business prospects of the Northern Sea Route and assesses the possibility of Russia’s 2013 Arctic claim approval by the United Nations Commission on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).
The Northern Sea Route (NSR) gradually becomes an important transport corridor: latest navigation season set a new record in the number of vessels. The Russian energy giant Gazprom successfully completed world’s first LNG supply via the route. What are the economic reasons behind this ambitious project?
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Officer of the Watch 