Railway Admins of Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Georgia to Create Transport Association

The railway administrations of Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan and Georgia have signed a memorandum of association.

At the last meeting of the Coordinating Committee for the Development of the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route (TITR), heads of the railway administrations of Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan and Georgia discussed the creation of an International Association of Trans-Caspian international transport route.

The Association, to be headquartered in Astana, will “focus on attracting transit and foreign trade cargo, and develop integrated logistics products from TITR."

The Association will further work out issues of "an effective tariff policy, optimization of costs and value of integrated services,” and will create a single technology transportation process, contributing to the reduction of administrative barriers related to border and customs procedures and processing of cargo and containers in ports.

All these measures are aimed at ensuring the competitiveness of TITR compared to alternative routes, with the Coordination Committee currently discussing the establishment of preferential tariff conditions for a number of Kazakhstani export goods, including grain, oil and non-ferrous metals, on the territories of the member countries.

"During the existence of the Coordinating Committee, considerable work has been done to build an effective tariff policy, introduce a single technology for transporting goods and create a joint integrated logistics product of Nomad Express,” said Kanata Alpysbaev, Vice President of the Office for Logistics of Kazakhstan Railways. “Container trains are running, and the Trans-Caspian international transport consortium is set up.”

Dimitri Dolaberidze