Improving Transnational Transport Corridors
In the OIC Member Countries: Concepts and Cases
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TRACECA works towards implementation of one stop border crossings rather than one exit
and one entry border post. According to Ismayil (2017), it is difficult and a bit slow to
implement, but Turkey-Georgia works as well as the border between Ukraine and Moldova.
Sometimes borders are closed due to political arguments, e.g. between Uzbekistan and
Tajikistan. In addition, the land borders between Armenia and Azerbaijan and Turkey
respectively are closed as mentioned above, but air transport works. Transports
Internationaux Routiers (or International Road Transports, TIR) for road transit is
implemented in most countries, but Iran has tougher rules than other countries. Iran has
ratified the Geneva convention for free passage but has implemented own version and imposes
a very high fuel surcharge.
The main problem for rail is the administrative process at border crossings. TIR does not apply
to rail, Agreement on International Goods Transport by Rail (SGMS) is the equivalent, but it is
not implemented along TRACECA. Paperless rail transport is wanted, but legal amendments
have to be done in member states. The border between Ukraine and Moldova works well,
though.
TRACECA asks the member countries about border crossing times, but it seems that the replies
are not fully useful to make up a coherent picture (Ismayil, 2017). For road transport,
TRACECA also works with the International Road Transport Union (IRU), which asked road
hauliers about the border transit times in the NELTI project but monitoring seems to have
stopped after 2009. TRACECA has a hotline system; the road hauliers/chauffeurs have a phone
number to the national coordinators and can report border crossing and other issues relating
to corridor performance. They are recorded and at the meetings, the accumulated lists are
discussed with an aim to remove bottlenecks. Rail border crossing is difficult and the paper
process can take 5-6 hours. Good examples are the new rail link Iran-Armenia with single
border control as well as the border Ukraine-Moldova.
The main border crossings, but not all, offer 24 hour service. (Ismayil, 2017) does not consider
interoperability a significant problem today, but it might become problematic when flows
increase.
A good indicator for capturing much of the desired information and for measuring the overall
effectiveness of corridor performance is the LPI. It indicates the easiness and efficiency of
trade in a country. This compilation includes customs and border procedures quality and
competence, infrastructure, tracking and tracing of goods in transit, paperwork needed for
international shipments and punctuality/timeliness. The World Bank issues the LPI (Arvis et
al., 2016) and the TRACECA member states are on the list as shown in Figure 29.
Figure 29 shows that a number of years of steadily higher values of LPI was followed by a
stagnation in 2014 and changed for the worse in the 2016 assessment. Most TRACECA member
states showed significantly lower performance. Among the countries of the selected routes,
Turkey has a good score of 3,42 giving a rank as 34th of 160 countries, but Uzbekistan
(2,40/118th), Azerbaijan (2,47/118th for 2010-2016, not ranked 2016), Georgia (2,35/130th),