Realising the Potential of the Middle Corridor
Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine and the ensuing sanctions greatly complicated
overland freight transport between Europe and China via the so-called Northern Corridor,
which runs through the Russian Federation. This has prompted renewed attention to
the development of the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route, a multimodal route
running through Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Türkiye – the so-called “Middle
Corridor”. The present report looks at the Middle Corridor’s potential and at the
challenges that must be overcome to realise it, drawing on the perspective of relevant
private-sector actors in the four Middle Corridor countries. Governments along the
corridor have invested heavily to improve transport infrastructure, yet important
bottlenecks remain due to the geography of the route, the number of border crossings
and the lack of regional trade integration. This study, based on surveys from and
interviews with the private sector, maps and sequences main reform priorities in relation
to regional integration, infrastructure, trade facilitation and supra-national coordination.
It suggests that the primary aim should be to develop the corridor not solely as a
transit route for actors from outside the region but as an engine of integration and
trade integration in Central Asia and the South Caucasus.
Published on December 13, 2023