Turkmenistan, Ashgabat, July 10 //Trend H.Hasanov/
Chairman of the State Service of Maritime and River Transport of Turkmenistan Meylis Mutdikov and chairman of the Supreme Chamber of Control Batyr Atdaev will visit Croatia and Australia, where they will become acquainted with the experience of shipyards in these countries and hold relevant talks, the official Turkmen source said on Tuesday.
The corresponding decree was signed by President Gurbanguly Berdymuhamedov.
During the visit, the official representatives from Turkmenistan will visit the Croatian shipyard Uljanik in Pula, as well as Hobart where the Australian company Incat is engaged in the construction of passenger-car ferries with aluminium or metal housings such as RO-PAX.
Turkmenistan announced a tender last year for a technical advisor to develop a conceptual design for a ship repair, shipbuilding base creation at the Turkmenbashi international seaport, followed by the technical supervision of construction works. It is expected that the company will also carry out repair and maintenance of vessels of different sizes.
Necessity is associated with an increase in traffic by sea and the fact that the port of Turkmenbashi is becoming a major transit point in the system of foreign economic relations of Turkmenistan and the most important element of international transit route for Europe - Caucasus - Asia, which runs from west to east.
Turkmenistan began forming its own tanker fleet in recent years. The ships were purchased in Russia and the Baltics. All of them are used for transhipment along the Caspian coast, delivering crude oil from the Turkmen ports to Aladja and Ekerem oil terminals in the village of Kenar.
A large scale reconstruction of the Turkmenbashi sea port which has international status is also being prepared. The country has already studied the experience of free economic zones in the UAE, Singapore and Hong Kong. The Avaza resort town is being formed on the Caspian Sea coast which has been declared a free economic zone by the authorities.