An Agreement on Strategic Partnership between Kazakhstan’s national railway company Kazakhstan Temir Zholy (KTZ) and JSC Latvijas dzelzceļš (Latvian Railway) was signed on September 29 in Riga, KTZ’s press office said. The document was signed during Kazakh First Deputy Prime Minister Askar Mamin’s working visit to Latvia.
In line with the agreement, the parties intend to continue cooperation aimed at increasing transcontinental land container transportations along the Silk Road routes, creating multimodal logistics chains. An agreement was reached on the development of the Europe-China-Europe transport corridor by forming a competitive trans-Kazakhstan route Altynkol-Dostyk-Riga-Altynkol-Dostyk and launching a container train along this route. It was decided to consider the possibility of participation of Latvian companies in the implementation of projects of the Khorgos – Eastern Gates special economic zone on the Kazakh-Chinese border.
For eight months of 2017 the volume of cargo transportation between Kazakhstan and Latvia amounted to 386.1 thousand tons, an increase of 61.7 thousand tons or 19 percent compared to the same period last year. Ten container trains on the route China-EU-China through the Latvian ports passed via Kazakhstan. During the talks it was also noted that Kazakhstan and Latvia have a great potential for further development of cooperation in the transport and logistics sphere.
