The price tag for the planned Uzbekistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan railway, also known as the Trans-Afghan Railway, will be towards $7bn according to estimates made by the three countries.
Officials at Uzbekistan’s transport ministry referred to the figure after November 15 talks between Uzbek transport minister Ilkhom Makhkamov, Pakistani industry development officials and two large transport and logistics companies, NLC-Logistics and TCS.
However, as always where infrastructure projects in Afghanistan are concerned, the neighbouring countries will seek security guarantees from the war-torn nation’s Taliban administration ahead of expediting the construction phase on Afghan territory.
The railway construction project could be implemented with a public-private-partnership (PPP) model in the construction-operation-transfer format, Uzbek officials also said.
The parties to the talks also agreed that multimodal transportation should be developed along the Trans-Afghan Corridor, while transportation fees should be reduced, cargo transportation simplified and the railway construction accelerated.
The Trans-Afghan Railway project was launched in 2018. At that time, an annual cargo transportation potential of 20mn tonnes worth $5bn was estimated.
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