According to a report by local Kazakhstan outlet Astana Times, the Kazakhstan Temir Zholy national railway company, Georgian Railway, and Azerbaijan Railways, have officially signed the agreement to establish this joint venture on October 26.
The newly formed entity aims to advance multimodal services on the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route (TITR), commonly referred to as the Middle Corridor. Established in 2017, the TITR International Association includes member countries such as Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, China, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Poland, Romania, and Turkey.
With the onset of the conflict in Ukraine, attention has shifted to the Middle Corridor, emerging as a more practical substitute for the primary path of the New Silk Road that traverses Russia and Belarus. Several companies are compelled to seek alternatives, and the Middle Corridor serves this purpose, albeit with current capacity limitations.
The aforementioned source notes that, in the previous year, freight traffic volume along the TITR in Kazakhstan surged by 2.5 times, reaching 1.5 million tons.