Improving Transnational Transport Corridors
In the OIC Member Countries: Concepts and Cases
93
shortcoming is that the data is collected and delivered following different methods, and the
picture is not fully coherent. A much more detailed picture is given by the TAPs, but at the risk
of being anecdotal in narrowly scoped projects and also the wider scoped projects give a
snapshot view rather than longitudinal data and key performance indices (KPIs) to monitor
and act upon.
4.3.10. Conclusion
TRACECA clearly benefits from having a secretariat accumulating experience, giving identity
and “a voice”. The main problem identified is the member states’ unwillingness to authorize
the TRACECA Secretariat to implement the common plans more forcefully. This is, however,
common for transport corridors as the main responsibility for funding infrastructure rests
with national states and supranational bodies are often restricted to impose harmonizing
regulation and fund infrastructure bottlenecks in close to borders.
EU’s lack of interest in continued funding of TRACECA is another major challenge. The reason
is not necessarily a mistrust or disappointment regarding TRACECA’s effectiveness and
success, but more likely related to financial limitations among EU member states and
uncertainty of the EU institutional framework but also attributed to the fact that politicians
tend to prioritize taking new initiatives over maintaining old ones. After all, TRACECA has
received funding over almost 20 years and, although much is to be done, the main goals of
revitalizing the Caucasus region and avoiding full-scale war can be regarded as achieved. There
are plenty of recommendations in the TAPs that TRACECA can implement, but the issue
remaining for TRACECA is what to implement in the future if no TAPs/new knowledge is
funded today. The success of TRACECA now depends on external geopolitical developments
like China’s plans for OBOR and the relationship between EU member states and Russia.
There is a lack of continuous performance data although several TAPs have given detailed
snapshot descriptions of the situation on a wide array of challenges. Surprisingly for a corridor
in a traditionally politically unstable region, very little information on security is found in the
TRACECA TAPs.
4.3.11. Recommendation
From TRACECA, COMCEC can learn that creating a corridor with “an identity”, is a long and
toilsome process subject to the commitment of the member countries. Taking decisions in
consensus has advantages for a successful implementation, but many ideas that are good for
the corridor as a whole is likely to be stopped when the member states assess the own benefit
of every initiative. The corridor development is then subject to many disparate decisions and
diplomatic negotiations, of which the corridor development is a small piece. Particularly
difficult is it obviously with diplomatic differences between individual member states like in
the case of Armenia and Azerbaijan. Shifting governments in member countries might also
complicate decision making and implementation due to the long time required from the first
feasibility study to the opening of new infrastructure links. Developing successful transport
corridors certainly requires a firm and constant support from the involved countries.