Baltic States – CIS, EU – Baltic States, Forum, Latvia, Transport

Embassy of Latvia in Uzbekistan, Ministry of Transport of Latvia, Association of International Business and Technologies and Association of developing business logistics organized the conference, informs UzDaily.com.

The conference was aimed at establishing efficient transport communication between Uzbekistan and Latvia and Uzbekistan and EU states, determine perspective transport routes, exchange experience in logistic management, etc.

Representatives of transport and logistics companies of Central Asia, China, Afghanistan, international organizations and institutions such as UNDP, USAID, GIZ, CAREC IBR, WB, ADB and others attended the event.

A delegation of Latvia led by Deputy Minister of Transport Uldis Reimanis arrived in Uzbekistan on 1 June 2015 to participate in the conference.

Uzbekistan is one of two doubly landlocked states of the world (along with Liechtenstein). That means that Uzbekistan is completely surrounded by landlocked nations. In the result, prices of products from Uzbekistan increases due to extra expenses for transportation. Uzbekistan actively works on developing transport corridors to export and imports of goods.

At the conference, the participants discussed perspectives of interaction between Latvia and Uzbekistan in transport policy, Great Silk Road project, transit of cargoes from Central Asia to the EU via Latvia.

At the conference, Bakhtiyor Ergashev, project coordinator of the Center for Economic Research, said that at the scenario of real growth of GDP at the level of 8%, Uzbekistan should invest US$46.7 billion to increase cargo transportation.

He said that to achieve 8% growth of economy, Uzbekistan should ensure 9.2% growth of cargo transportation in near future. In next 15 years, the volume of cargo transportation should rose 4.4 times to 6.04 billion tonnes.