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HŽ Announces New Business Organization

The management of HŽ Holding expects to finish this year positively in business, as well as all its parent companies, while announcing a restructuring process and a new organization for next year through which they plan to increase revenues and reduce costs, stated the CEO of HŽ Holding, Zlatko Rogožar, at today’s press conference where the new HŽ timetable was also presented, which will be valid from December 12 of this year until December 10, 2011.

Rogožar and other members of the HŽ Holding Management base their expectations for a positive result this year on the good results of the parent companies for the first nine months of this year, especially HŽ Cargo, which recorded an increase of 7.4 percent compared to the same period last year. In addition, as Rogožar explained, they expect an extraordinary income of 15 million euros by the end of this year from receivables that belong to HŽ after the separation from the ex-Yugoslav railways. As part of the restructuring that HŽ Holding is expecting next year, it will be considered whether there is and how much excess staff there is and whether they can or cannot be reassigned to new jobs that will also be created as part of that process. Rogožar also stated that nothing ‘sudden’ will be done regarding employees and their potential layoffs, while he mentioned that employee salaries are at the Croatian average, neither higher nor lower, and that workers can be absolutely satisfied.

He also stated that HŽ Holding needs a shift in financing, which will also be addressed next year. Regarding this year’s business, Rogožar emphasized that the share of rail transport, despite the crisis year and reduced volume, increased in the first nine months of this year to 14.2 percent from last year’s 10.4 percent and that the growth trend continues. He emphasized that new investment cycles have started this year in the modernization of passenger trains, in infrastructure, and in the opening of cargo centers, with the first of them in Slavonski Brod, followed by such centers in Rijeka, Zagreb, and Ploče. In response to a journalist’s inquiry to comment on today’s media reports that he is in a conflict of interest due to the family company run by his son, which deals with similar businesses as HŽ Cargo, Rogožar replied that “what is written is not true, that for 16 years he has had a 0.73 percent ownership stake in that company, and that the law allows up to 5 percent.” He also stated that this company does not do business with HŽ Cargo, nor with HAC, nor with other companies mentioned in the reports. (H)