Steady operation of a freight train on the so-called new "Silk Road" requires Ukrainian membership of the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route (TMTM) and establishment of a single through tariff. Ivan Fedorko, the Ukrzaliznytsia public railway company’s director of freight transport and logistics, announced this to reporters, the Interfax Ukraine news agency reports.
"The train was a demonstrative. It departed with the aim of working out all the train paths through Ukraine, the Black Sea, Georgia, Azerbaijan, the Caspian Sea, and Kazakhstan. The train arrived there in 16 days. Then, it persevered and a decision has already been made that our people will go there and that the train will later go back on another a demonstrative trip to enable us to clearly understand where there are problems and fully determine the time that we should guarantee shippers and consignees in Ukraine and abroad," he said during a meeting with journalists in Kyiv on Tuesday, 5 April.
Meanwhile, according to Fedorko, this train is currently idle following the completion of its trip to the Dostyk station.
"The problem is that we are not members of the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route and for this to happen, a meeting chaired by Kazakhstan, has to take place. This meeting was planned for February, but it was moved to early March and then to March 27 because of circumstances beyond our control. We waited for them to invite us, we did not receive an invitation, I made a proposal to invite them to us – and Yevhen [Kravtsov] support this proposal – since there was no other option. We cannot discuss tariffs until we enter this corridor," Fedorko said.
Thus, according to him, Ukrzaliznytsia is inviting all the participants in this route to Odesa on 15 April.
"We will clarify the issue of tariffs because the current tariff is sufficiently uncompetitive. On our part, as Ukraine, we have lowered it, Azerbaijan and Georgia are promising to lower it for us and it is necessary to work with Kazakhstan to lower it so that we can jointly arrive at a competitive tariff," Fedorko said.
He added that transportation of all types of cargo on the route is being considered.
"We have Polish and Belgian companies that are interested in transporting their goods through this corridor, but we will not go there until we find out who we are on the international route and until we reach agreement on tariffs at the level of the four countries. At this meeting, we should join the Trans-Caspian MTM and then specialists from all four countries should handle the establishment of a single tariff. When we work out a normal competitive tariff, then we will go. We already have cargoes. These are confectionary goods, sugar, transportation of Kazakh coal to ArcelorMittal Kryvyi Rih, there are requests to transport meat, etc.," Fedorko said.
As Ukrainian News earlier reported, the Ministry of Infrastructure and Ukrzaliznytsia launched the trial run of a container train on the new "Silk Road" on 15 January 2016. The train, which traveled on the route Ukraine-Georgia-Azerbaijan-Kazakhstan-China, reached China on the sixteenth day (in the early hours of 31 January 2016).
According to Minister of Infrastructure Andrii Pyvovarskyi, this train is one of the alternatives for the delivery of goods between China and Asian countries on the one hand and between China and Europe on the other hand. The The route will be competitive in terms of delivery period (the one-way travel time is 10-12 days) and price, compared with the routes that pass through Russia Russia.
The Ukrainian government also expected involvement of Turkmenistan in the project and expansion of the project to delivery of fuel, particularly liquefied natural gas and petroleum products. Meanwhile, the first train has not yet departed on the return trip.
