The Main Problems of the Road Freight Transport Sector in Greece

The road freight transport sector in Greece, a once-thriving industry of the Greek economy, currently faces many threatening challenges. In this paper, we conducted a literature review and a series of four in-depth interviews with stakeholders of the sector in order to identify the main problems that the industry currently faces and to find and propose possible solutions. Many problems were found, such as poor quality of the national network, problematic elements of labor legislation, bureaucracy, lack of professional truck drivers, unfair competition from foreign road freight transportation companies (e.g., different taxation and insurance contributions, absence of controls for foreign road freight transportation companies, different labor legislations, non-observance of bilateral reciprocity between Greece and Turkey), unfair competition from domestic road freight transportation companies (e.g., maintenance of specific legal status for some of them), lack of subsidies (e.g., for fuel costs, to replace old trucks with new anti-pollution technology), problems after the COVID-19 pandemic, and many more. Regarding all these problems solutions are proposed, such as improvement of the road network, elimination of violations, revision of the legislative framework, ways to attract professional drivers, state funding, and subsidies (e.g., fuel cost subsidy, subsidy for replacement of old trucks with new of anti-pollution technology), adherence to the principle of reciprocity in bilateral negotiations, and many more. The road freight transport sector in Greece faces an existential threat; more in-depth research is required, and the Greek state should take emergency measures.