Improving Transnational Transport Corridors
In the OIC Member Countries: Concepts and Cases
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The rest have a permit/quota system. As the member states distribute these permits, it is
subject to corruption and the road quotas/permits are held in shortage to stimulate rail
transport. Road hauliers often complain to TRACECA that they do not get enough permits and
if no permits where required, road transport is likely to three-fold according to Ismayil (2017).
Transparency is OK, but the quota system does not help integration and fairness along
TRACECA. Ismayil (2017) finds the multilateral TRACECA Permit System much better than the
quota system.
Common rules obviously apply within the EU part of TRACECA, and most TRACECA member
states adhere to international rules like the Vienna Convention on Road Traffic. Iran, however,
has an own set of rules.
For rail transport, the CIS member states have monopolies as a continuation from the Soviet
times, although new equipment is purchased. TRACECA wants deregulation and competition
on the tracks and at least division between infrastructure and operations following European
experiences (Flodén and Woxenius, 2017). The Caucasian countries are now assisted by DB
Schenker/DB International to investigate how rail competition can be implemented.
Commercially, rail works like the UIC in the EU. Each country claims how much they need to
cover their costs and a reasonable profit and together the railways give a quote for an
international haulage (Ismayil, 2017).
The big difference from Soviet times, and that to the worse, is that the operations are now
restricted to each CIS country’s territory. Locomotives can be borrowed between countries,
but they generally stay on national territory and locomotives are changed at borders.
Nevertheless, it does not add transit time since locomotive changes are carried out during
administrative processing at the borders that, as mentioned above, can take 5-6 hours and at a
minimum 2 hours.
The rail gauge is different on either side of the Georgian-Turkish border. Azerbaijan has some
passenger wagons with flexible boogies and there is a boogie exchange terminal at the border.
Wagons with flexible boogies are expensive, though, so often consignments are transloaded
between rail wagons with different gauges. Containers could ease the border problem of
different rail gauges by transshipping containers between wagons. The new railway Baku-Kars
at the Georgia-Turkey border (TRACECA route T19) via Tblisi is soon ready. It will mostly
transport passengers, bulk and oil but hopefully also more containers in the future.
Also maritime transport in the Caspian Sea is dominated by the states although there are no
national monopolies. In the Azerbaijan Caspian Shipping Company (ACSC), the state has >51%
and the director is appointed by the state. ACSC has vessels from the Soviet time, but competes
with other nations on the Caspian Sea. Kazakhstan has ordered new ferries from Croatia
(AzerNews, 2016), that will be shipped through Azov Sea and canals/rivers into the Caspian
Sea (Mamedov, 2017). This route is not used much for shipping due to limited draught;
allowing to use only half of the load capacity of ships. Instead, crude oil is sent in pipelines