Azernews.Az

By Nigar Orujova

The commissioning of the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway will open up new opportunities for the development of the international freight transport to Eurasia, said Kaspars Ozolins, State Secretary of the Latvian Transport Ministry.

"The development of a transit corridor from Central Asia through Azerbaijan and the Black Sea to the Baltic Sea region, in particular to Latvia is a very promising direction,” he told Trend.

“The commissioning of the BTK railroad will further strengthen the strategic importance of Azerbaijan in the region and also will open up new opportunities for the development of international cargo transportation from the Baltic Sea region, along with the growth of cargo transportation from the ports of Georgia to Azerbaijan and Turkey," he added.

Ozolins noted that there is the convenient transportation infrastructure from the Baltic countries to the Black Sea. “In particular, Latvian Bison container train, connecting the Baltic ports to the ports of Ilyichevsk and Odessa on the Black Sea, is operating.

“Moreover, Latvia intends to use the Baltika-Transit container train in case of developing the cargo transportation from Azerbaijan to the Baltic countries,” he said. “This train passes through the territory of Russia and connects the ports of the Baltic countries to final destinations in Kazakhstan and Central Asia."

“Latvia is still interested in connecting the railways of the Baltic States to the railway projects of the Caucasus and Central Asia with the help of Baltic-Transit and Zubr container trains, and it sees Azerbaijan as an important partner for the development of transit transportation to Central Asia and Iran,” said Ozolins.

New railways open up new perspectives, he emphasized.

If the length of the railway is more than 300 kilometers, then it is much more profitable to transport cargo using it, he added.

The Ministry spokesman said that in particular, the sea route is not suitable for the transportation of food products, which form the basis of export of Latvia, since long time ago.

“Air transportation between Baku and Riga has great potential, but its cost is high,” he said.

However, it is currently difficult to talk about how beneficial the transport of goods via the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway will be, since everything depends on tariffs, according to Ozolins.

Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway is being constructed on the base of Georgia-Azerbaijan-Turkish interstate agreement. The project is funded by the Azerbaijani State Oil Foundation in accordance with the country’s head decree “Realization of the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars project” since February 21, 2007.

As part of the project, a new 105 km branch of the railway line is being constructed. The project is expected to be finished in 2015. And the launch of the first test train is expected to be accomplished by the end of the year.

The capacity of the corridor will be 17 million tons per a year. At the initial stage, the figure will be one million passengers and 6.5 million tons of cargo.

Latvia may increase export to Azerbaijan

Ozolins said Latvia is interested in increasing the export of its goods, especially food, to the new markets.

This is connected with the cessation of food exports from Latvia to Russia due to Moscow’s restrictions, he added.

"But we must find the markets where these products will be in demand,” Ozolins said.

“They may be popular in the CIS countries because everybody knows these products there. But it will be difficult to export them to other countries because there are other principles of nutrition. We will have to supplement our products. As a result, we will obtain other, not our product that everyone knows," he explained.

In particular, the shipments from Latvia to Azerbaijan have increased, the state secretary added. The previous agreement about increasing the number of vehicle transport in 2015 testifies to this fact.

The cargo shippers of each country obtained 250 permits for bilateral and transit freight transportation and 80 permits - for shipments to (from) the third countries.

For comparison, the initial quota was set at 200 permits for bilateral and transit transportation and 50 permits for cargo transportation to (from) the third countries in 2014. In case of necessity, the quota for 2015 may increase.

“The potential to increase the turnover exists, but its implementation requires some infrastructures,” said Ozolins.

“In order to deliver the goods to alternative markets, it is necessary to adjust supply via the existing rail infrastructure. It is necessary to deliver the goods via the Black Sea and further transport them by trucks,” he added

He noted that after the commissioning of the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway, Latvia will consider the possibility of transporting goods along this route.

However, the most promising alternative market for the export of Latvian goods is China, according to Ozolins.

“This is a very serious potential partner, with whom a dialogue is currently being held,” he said. “It is being discussed which certification Latvian businesses and products should have in order to meet the requirements of China.”

“Transportation of goods in this direction is primarily made via Baltic-Transit container train via Russia, as well as by air and sea,” said the representative of the Ministry.

He said that currently the Latvian goods, which were initially planned to be delivered to Russia, but their import was banned later, were redirected to other EU countries.

Latvia is famous for high qualities of food products, especially dairy products, which may attract attention in Azerbaijan.

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Nigar Orujova is AzerNews’s staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @o_nigar

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