Azernews.Az

By Nigar Orujova

Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Georgia and Turkey will introduce a single tariff for transportation of goods within the Silk Wind project, Kazakhstan's transport ministry said Thursday.

The Silk Wind project is serving as a supplement to the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway, which aims to link directly the railway systems of Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey to transport large amounts of cargo and passengers and is under construction.

The proposed project participating countries are Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Georgia and Turkey. The project was initiated in the frame of the Transport Corridor Europe-Caucasus-Asia (TRACECA).

TRACECA is an international transport cooperation program between the EU and its partner countries in Eastern Europe, South Caucasus and Central Asia. Current TRACECA member states are Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Armenia, Moldova, Romania, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Turkey, Ukraine and Iran.

According to the Kazakh Transport and Communications Ministry, the Silk Wind project's objective is to create a multimodal route of trains (using containers/ro-ro) with preliminary exchange of information between customs authorities and railway operators of the participating countries.

"The use of a unified through rate is one of the key issues in the creation of a competitive route," the Kazakh ministry said. "The main task of the project working groups, among other organizational issues, is elaboration of the definition of agreed tariffs as well as the conventional route parameters..."

The ministry's statement said further that "creating the necessary conditions and simplifying administrative procedures" in the frame of the project will increase the volume of trade and boost economic cooperation, improve transportation and logistics capabilities and increase the flow of freight in transport corridors of the participating countries.

The measures proposed to simplify the Silk Wind train customs clearance procedures were discussed in Azerbaijan in October 2012, during the first meeting of the Turkic states' customs service heads.

Akif Mustafayev, TRACECA national secretary for Azerbaijan, said on October 10 that Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Georgia and Turkey will sign two documents within the Silk Wind project.

"These are a memorandum of understanding among the transport ministries of the four countries, and the other one is an agreement on development of multi-modal transportation," Mustafayev noted.

He said the MoU between the ministries of the four countries could be signed early next year, while the agreement -- during the next intergovernmental TRACECA conference, which will take place in Dushanbe in May 2013.

Launching the Silk Wind project will be possible only after the construction of the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway is completed.

The railway will be fully commissioned in 2014, while a first test train from Azerbaijan to the Turkish border is planned to be dispatched by late 2012, Azerbaijan Railways chairman Arif Asgarov said earlier.

The railway will increase the flow of containers and other types of cargo from Asia to Europe. Its throughput capacity will peak at 17 million tons of cargo per year. Initially, the capacity will be 6.5 million tons of consignments and 1 million passengers.

The railway is gaining more and more interest of Central Asian countries and may become an even larger regional route.

Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan stated their interest in implementing the Navoi-Turkmenbashi-Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway, while Kazakhstan is closely involved in creating a link to the railway running from Turkey to Georgia.