French annual rail freight toll increases to match consumer price index

The annual increase in tolls paid by rail freight operators in France over the next couple of years is expected to be in line with national consumer price index (CPI) trends. According to figures from SNCF Réseau, 2024 will show a rise of 2.7 per cent in tolls compared to a CPI of 2.5 per cent.

Increases of 1.7 per cent are projected for both 2025 and 2026 with the CPI expected to move upwards at the same rate for each of these years. Between 2021 and 2023, the cumulative annual increase in tolls for freight trains was 6.1 per centversus +14.3 per cent for the CPI over this period.

Reaction from the industry

Alexandre Gallo, President and CEO of DB Cargo France and President of the Association Française du Rail, commentied on the outlook for freight trains tolls in France. “These annual increases form part of a ‘performance contract’ between the State and SNCF Réseau which was signed in 2021. Given the unit cost per km of freight train paths – 2.50 euros on average – a rise of a few per cent is manageable. It’s important to note that since 2021, rail freight has benefitted from a subsidy on the cost of train paths. This works out at around 40 per cent in 2024, and will probably be a little less in 2025.”

Gallo said that freight train tolls in France are much lower than in neighbouring countries due to the fact that operators only pay on a marginal cost basis and not on the full cost. “On the other hand, as the saying goes: ‘When you pay peanuts, you get monkeys’. The performance of our infrastructure manager (SNCF Réseau) is not yet up to scratch, even if it has improved in recent years. It would therefore be unfortunate if we were made to pay more for capacity that is not on a par with rail infrastructure managers in other European countries”, he concluded.

Comparison with passengers

In comparison, tolls levied on standard passenger trains rose 2.8 times less quickly than consumer prices between 2021 and 2023, “bearing in mind that the CPI only partially reflects changes in our costs, which are highly dependent on the price of raw materials (steel, energy, etc.),” France’s rail network manager explained.

Over this period, tolls saw a cumulative annual increase of 5.2 per cent versus +14.3 per cent for the CPI. In 2024, tolls for standard passenger trains are set to show a rise of 8.0 per cent compared to a CPI of 2.5 per cent. In 2025 and 2026 increases of 6.0 per cent and 4.6 per cent respectively are projected – well ahead of the CPI for both of these years of +1.7 per cent.