BAKU, Azerbaijan, October 6. A special survey and assessment will begin in October to identify bottlenecks along the southern branch of the Middle Corridor, the advisor to the chairman of Azerbaijan Railways CJSC, Emil Mammadov, said, Trend's correspondent reports.
Mammadov made the statement at the German-Azerbaijani Strategic Partnership and Connectivity Conference held in Baku on Tuesday.
He noted that strengthening coordination and cooperation among the corridor’s participants is of great importance for the current and future development of the Middle Corridor.
According to E. Mammadov, work has been underway for quite some
time to create a “single window” system, which will allow for
offering various solutions and services to cargo owners along the
Middle Corridor.
“One of the latest initiatives in this direction has been the
establishment of a joint venture called ‘Middle Corridor
Multimodal.’ Currently, the founding members of this joint venture
are Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Georgia, and China,” he noted.
According to him, the joint venture provides the Middle Corridor participating countries with the opportunity to participate both in the provision of transportation services and in initiatives related to the corridor’s development.
“Coordination and joint activities within the framework of the joint venture allow us to better showcase the opportunities of the Middle Corridor and make the corridor more transparent. A shipper needs to know where their cargo is and at what stage of transport it is,” E. Mammadov said.
He emphasized that such cooperation helps resolve the problems and challenges that shippers may face when transporting cargo along the Middle Corridor.
The advisor to the ADY chairman also noted the role of associations operating along the Middle Corridor in the route’s development.
“The Middle Corridor Association (TITR) is one of the organizations working in this direction. Another association is the ‘Eurasian Transport Route,’ established at the initiative of ‘Azerbaijan Railways.’ This route covers the southern branch of the Middle Corridor,” he said.
Furthermore, Mammadov noted that the “Eurasian Transport Route” covers Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan, and Georgia, crossing the Caspian Sea.
“This month, in October, we are beginning to conduct a survey along this route. This will help identify limiting factors. The assessment will reveal what the actual problems are currently along the southern route,” E. Mammadov emphasized.
According to him, based on the results of the assessment, further steps and initiatives necessary for the route’s development will be determined.
“Then we will determine what steps need to be taken and what initiatives need to be implemented so that this route can also reach the level of development we have currently achieved on the Middle Corridor,” he added.
