Kazakhstan Railways beefs up transit cargo turnover

In the first six months of this year, Kazakhstan Railways increased transit cargo turnover by 39.1% to 27.8 billion ton-kilometers, the company said in a statement. Container transit grew by 26% over the same period.

In the middle of July, during a joint meeting by the railway administrations of Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan with exporters, Kazakhstan Railways officials said that over the period from January to June 2023, the amount of cargo going via the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route (TITR) increased 1.8 times as much as last year to 1.3 million tons.

The Kazakhstan Railways’ turnover over the first six months of 2023 amounted to 130.4 billion ton-kilometers, which is an 8.6% increase over the previous year. In terms of passenger traffic the increase was 1.2% to 5.7 billion passenger kilometers).

The company also reported that the export of Kazakhstani grain increased by 33% to eight million tons over 10 months of the current agricultural year (from September 2022 to June 2023), followed by milled products (+31% to 2.1 million tons). Among the main customers for Kazakhstani grain are Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Afghanistan.

In the first half of the year, the railway operator acquired 36 locomotives, 48 flatcars and 14 passenger cars. The company is expecting to obtain an additional 139 locomotives, 620 freight and 50 passenger cars by the end of the year. So far, Kazakhstan Railways is the largest owner of locomotives, freight and passenger cars in the country. As of January 2023, it owned 1,700 locomotives, 44,600 freight and 2,400 passenger cars.

In 2022, the company’s cargo turnover increased by 5.1% to 245.2 billion ton-kilometers due to a boom in export and transit activities. For example, the transit cargo turnover beefed up by 14% due to a surge in the transportation of coal, iron ore, oil products, grain, chemicals and soda, fertilizers, non-ferrous and ferrous metals and food products.

Last year, Kazakhstan Railways reported an 11.5% increase in revenue ($3.3 billion). Cargo and passenger transportation accounted for 87% and 6% of this revenue, respectively.