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Review of transport sector in Azerbaijan (January-July 2017)

Analysis Materials 13 September 2017 14:11 (UTC +04:00)

- Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev signed a decree approving a memorandum of understanding between Azerbaijan Railways CJSC and Iranian Railways on the development of railways, signed on March 5, 2017, in Tehran.

Azerbaijan Railways CJSC is instructed to ensure the implementation of provisions of the decree after the MoU’s entry into force.

Meanwhile, Azerbaijan’s Foreign Ministry is instructed to send a notification to the Iranian government on the implementation of domestic procedures required for the MoU’s entry into force.

- Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev has signed an order to provide funding for the construction of Zire-Turkan highway.

Under the presidential order, three million manat is allocated from the Presidential Contingency Fund for the construction of the highway, which connects two residential areas with the total population of 24,000 people.

- Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev has signed an order to provide funding for the construction of a road in Barda district.

Under the presidential order, 6.8 million manat are allocated from the Presidential Contingency Fund for the construction of Yeni Dashkend-Umudalilar road connecting 17 residential areas with the population of 15,000 people.

- Azerbaijan and the EU agreed on the main part of the draft agreement "On common airspace".

The talks were held in Brussels in early July. From the Azerbaijani side, the management of the country’s State Civil Aviation Administration took part in the negotiations. Intensive negotiations have been held for two days and the main part of the agreement was agreed upon.

The next round of negotiations between Azerbaijan and the EU on an agreement on common airspace will be held in Baku in October.

- Azerbaijani, Turkish and Georgian Foreign Ministers Elmar Mammadyarov, Mevlut Cavusoglu, Mikheil Janelidze have agreed to develop a roadmap for further cooperation for 2017-2020,” Mammadyarov said at a briefing following the trilateral meeting in Baku.

Mammadyarov said that the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars (BTK) railway construction project will be implemented till late 2017.

"There is a need for this project, as well as the necessary volume of cargo transportation," he added. “Three countries also intend to use other ways of cargo transportation, namely marine and main ones."

- An agreement was signed as part of the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars (BTK) railway project in order to establish a logistics center in Kars.

Private entrepreneurs will be able to annually send two million tons of goods with preferences via the BTK railway.

The BTK railway is being constructed on the basis of the Georgian-Azerbaijani-Turkish intergovernmental agreement. The peak capacity of the railway will be 17 million tons of cargo per year. At the initial stage, this figure will be one million passengers and 6.5 million tons of cargo.

- Azerbaijan and Turkey have signed an agreement to create an electronic system for the exchange of information on transit vehicle transportation.

The document was signed by Chairman of Azerbaijan’s State Customs Committee Aydin Aliyev and Turkey’s Minister of Customs and Trade Bulent Tufenkci.

Baku hosted a trilateral meeting attended by Chairman of Azerbaijan’s State Customs Committee Aydin Aliyev, Georgia’s First Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Dimitry Kumsishvili and Turkey’s Minister of Customs and Trade Bulent Tufenkci.

Representatives of the three countries’ border agencies, embassies also took part in the meeting.

Along with the mentioned document, the sides also signed a joint declaration on expansion of the trilateral cooperation in customs issues among the countries. The document envisages the establishment of a permanent commission for development of cooperation among customs authorities of Azerbaijan, Turkey and Georgia, as well as between customs bodies and business structures of the region.

Some 126.2 million tons of cargo were carried by Azerbaijani modes of transport in January-July 2017 or by 2.1 percent more than in January-July 2016, the Azerbaijani State Statistics Committee’s report said.

According to the report, the volume of non-oil cargo increased by 4.4 percent and reached 94.6 million tons.

Some 80.5 percent of the total volume of goods transported accounted for the private sector during the reporting period.

Some 62.4 percent of all cargo were transported by vehicles, 27.1 percent - by pipelines, 6.7 percent - by railway, 3.7 percent - by ships, 0.1 percent – planes.

Some 1,085.9 million people used passenger transport in January-July 2017, which is by 2.3 percent more than in January-July 2016. Most of the passengers were transported by vehicles (87.5 percent), metro (12.2 percent) and the rest part – other modes of transport.

Some 8.4 million tons of cargo were transported by railway in January-July 2017 or by 1.6 percent more than in January-July 2016.

On average per day, the number of loaded carriages made up 353 and unloaded - 408.

Average daily load of carriages in the northern direction is 13,500 tons, in western direction - 5,200 tons and in southern direction – 900 tons.

Some 4.61 million tons of cargo were transported by ships in January-July 2017 or by 52.6 percent more than in January-July 2016. Some 48.5 percent of the transported goods accounted for oil cargo. The volume of goods handled in Azerbaijani ports amounted to 6.09 million tons in January-July 2017.

Some 68.6 million tons of cargo were transported by vehicles in January-July 2017, which is by 2.2 percent more than in January-July 2016.

Some 950.2 million people were transported by vehicles in January-July 2017, which is by 1.7 percent more compared to January-July 2016. Some 96 percent of the passengers were transported by buses and 4 percent - by cars.

Some 132.9 million people were transported by metro increasing by 6.1 percent in January-July 2017 compared to January-July 2016.

Some 1,285,200 passengers were transported by air transport in January-July 2017 which is by 21.3 percent more than in January-July 2016. Some 0.1 percent of shipment by this kind of transport accounted for the private sector.

In January-July 2017, 19.37 million tons of oil was transported via the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline compared to 20.6 million tons in the same period of 2016.

“In January-July 2017, 78.3 percent of oil transported via the country’s main pipelines accounted for the BTC pipeline,” says the report.

According to the report, 24.73 million tons of oil was transported via the country’s main pipelines in January-July 2017 as compared to 26.4 million tons in the same period of 2016.

Total length of the BТС is 1,768 kilometers, including a 443-kilometer section running through Azerbaijan, a 249-kilometer section in Georgia and a 1,076-kilometer section in Turkey. The construction of the pipeline started in April 2003. It was filled with oil on May 18, 2005.

The report also says that 4.43 billion cubic meters of gas were transported via the South Caucasus Pipeline (Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum) in January-July 2017, as compared to 4.16 billion cubic meters in the same period of 2016.

The length of the Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum pipeline is more than 700 kilometers. The pipeline transports gas produced at the Shah Deniz gas and condensate field in the Azerbaijani sector of the Caspian Sea. The gas is supplied to Georgia and Turkey.

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