Exit to the sea

It is noteworthy that Kazakhstan announced its intention to become a transit hub a year before the announcement of the "One Belt - One Way" initiative, this was done in the "Nurly Zhol" program, announced in the presidential message of 2012.

It is not surprising that the signing in 2016 of the agreement on pairing Nurly Zhol and EPPP passed without a hitch, without a hitch - the rare case when the interests of the countries coincide almost completely. Senior Chinese officials often say that Kazakh-Chinese relations are going through their best period. Accumulated direct Chinese investments in Kazakhstan amounted to $ 23.6 billion for 2015 (the same figure for Russia - $ 3.4 billion).

At the same time, in the total commodity turnover of the Central Asian and Caucasian countries, Russia's share is consistently declining, while the share of East Asian countries, mainly China, is growing. According to the consultant of the World Bank Stefki Slavova, in 2000 the share of Russia in the region's trade turnover was 22%, East Asia - 6%. In 2015, 16% - in Russia, 24% - in East Asia.

Kazakhstan directly participates in three directions of the Eurasian transcontinental corridor EPPI: China-Kazakhstan-Russia-Europe, with access to the Baltic Sea; China-Kazakhstan-Azerbaijan-Georgia-Turkey-Europe, within the framework of the international TRACECA program, with access to the Black and Mediterranean Seas; China - Kazakhstan - Turkmenistan - Iran - Pakistan, with access to the Persian Gulf and the Indian Ocean.

To move in these directions it is supposed on six routes, and Kazakhstan participates in five of them.

The container from the port of Liunyanggang, where Kazakhstan now has its own terminal, is loaded onto a train following Alashankou or Khorgos. On Dostyk or Altynkol (the Kazakh sides of the relevant border crossings), it is reloaded to our container train and follows either to the port of Aktau, where it moves by ferry to Baku to proceed through Georgia to Ukraine or to southern Europe. Or, in case of urgency and importance, it is reloaded to the airport by car. Or on the container train OTLK (United Transport and Logistics Company of Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus) and sent to the European part of the continent. Either through Kyzylorda and Mangistau goes to Turkmenistan and further to Iran (this year the first container train from the Chinese Yiwu to Tehran with the length of the route more than 9000 km and the delivery time of 14 days was launched).

Since 2014 the company KTZH has started to actively acquire ports abroad. The first was the terminal and logistics center in Lianyungang, where Lianyungang Port Group LLC owns 51%, and KTZ Express (the KTZ Express subsidiary, created specifically for multimodal transportation) - 49%. The project cost $ 99.3 million, of which $ 35.1 million invested in the port, $ 33.7 million - KTZ Express, the rest was credited by Chinese banks. By 2020, the volume of container processing in the TLC is planned to increase to 550 thousand TEU (20-foot equivalent) from 193 thousand TEU in 2015.

KTZ Express is to launch two more terminals in the seaports - Iran's Bander Abbas and Lithuanian Klaipeda. An agreement was reached with the Indian authorities regarding the port of Mundra (the project is planned for 2017). It is also planned to build TLC in Russian (Moscow, Ekaterinburg, Novosibirsk, 2017) and Chinese (Xian, Zhanzhou, 2018) cities.

The internal terminal network is actively developing in Shymkent, Astana, Aktobe. In 2017 construction of the TLC in Atyrau, Oral, Aktau, Kostanay, Pavlodar and Semey will start. Over the past six years, 1,700 km of new railway lines have been built in Kazakhstan.

In December 2012, the Altynkol-Khorgos railway crossing was put into operation, thanks to which Kazakhstan had a second railway station on the border with China, except for the Soviet Dostyk. The Zhezkazgan-Beineu road (1039 km) has reduced the main route of the Europe-Caucasus-Asia corridor by 750 km to 750 km and is integrated with the Georgian-Turkish line Akhalkalaki-Kars (to be commissioned in late 2016). The launch of the Uzen-Bereket-Gorgan railway (928 km), together with Turkmenistan and Iran, has become the new direct branch of the North-South transport corridor.

"The effect of launching these lines was a decrease in transportation costs from 10 to 30%, delivery times from one to three days," said Yury Lavrinenko, deputy chairman of the Union of Transport Workers of Kazakhstan. In the first nine months of 2016, KTZ's cargo turnover increased by almost 1.5 billion ton kilometer compared to the same period last year, reaching 136.9 billion ton-km.

The port of Aktau is expanding. From 2015 to 2020, in the development and modernization of transport and transport and logistics infrastructure, Kazakhstan intends to invest $ 23.7 billion.