Netherlands can offer technical support for new Baku port
By Kamila Aliyeva
The Netherlands can offer technical support for the Baku International Sea Trade Port in Alat township in Azerbaijan.
This was stated by former president of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), chairman of the Dutch Friends of Azerbaijan Group Rene van der Linden in an exclusive interview with Trend.
He noted that in March a high-level delegation from the Port of Baku will visit Venlo, the most important logistics center in the Netherlands on the mainland.
“We have huge industrial settlements, all connected to logistics facilities. We can offer the most modern innovative way of dealing with logistics,” said Rene van der Linden.
He noted that at the moment, the discussions are being held at the level of Dutch government and the Port of Baku.
Azerbaijan is now building a modern port with all the facilities and the Netherlands can render technical support on the basis of its longstanding experience.
Earlier, Azerbaijan’s Economy Minister Shahin Mustafayev said that the first phase of construction of the Baku International Sea Trade Port in Alat settlement will be completed in May 2018.
Mustafayev noted that after the first phase’s completion, the port’s capacity will be 15 million tons per year.
“The port’s capacity will be increased up to 25 million tons of cargo and 500,000 containers per year at the second stage, and up to one million containers per year – at the next stage,” the minister said.
The Port of Baku is located on an area of 400 hectares of land, of which about 100-115 ha cover the area for the development of the international Logistics and Trade Zone. The northern areas around the port are reserved for future expansion of logistics, industrial, and manufacturing activity.
The port is expected to become one of the leading trade and logistics hubs of Eurasia. The implementation of all three phases of construction is projected to increase the capacity up to 7,660 tons on a daily basis.
Located at the intersection of the East-West and North-South transport corridors, the new Baku International Sea Trade Port, the construction of which is an integral part of the policy of turning Azerbaijan into an important transport and logistics center of the region, plays a crucial and important role in expanding the country's transit capacities.
The new port will serve as a transport and cargo station for the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway, which was commissioned last year.
Thus, a basis will be created for the formation of an efficient and sustainable logistics chain that will ensure the concentration of cargo flows entering the country along the corridors from the north, south, east and west in the new port complex and their transportation from here along the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway line to Europe or in an easterly direction by ships.
Also, the creation of the Free Trade Zone (FTZ) that will ensure a wider transit and transport potential of the country is envisaged on the territory of the port.
FTZ will be located within the grounds of the new port, covering an area of 100 hectares. Since the new port is being built at the major railway juncture connecting the North-South and the East-West railway lines in Azerbaijan, FTZ will also have rail access. Serving as a multimodal transit logistics hub, the new port and FTZ will become a major consolidation and distribution centre in Central Eurasia that provides a wide range of value added services.
The FTZ is expected to bring up to $1 billion just in the first few years. Special tax and customs policy, which will be pursued in the territory of the free trade zone will also stipulate further development and simplification of a number of procedures.
In 2017, the volume of freight traffic through the Baku International Sea Trade Port (excluding the oil terminal) rose by 31 percent and totaled 4.4 million tons as compared to 2016. About 85.7 percent of the total volume accounted for the share of transit cargo transportation.
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Kamila Aliyeva is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @Kami_Aliyeva
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