ASTANA – Kazakhstan plans to designate KazMunayGas-Aero as the single operator for aviation fuel to address shortages and reduce dependency on imports, Minister of Transport Marat Karabayev said at a Dec. 23 meeting in the Mazhilis, a lower house of Parliament, reported Mazhilis’s press service.
Photo credit: Cirium.
Aviation
According to Karabayev, enabling large purchases will eliminate intermediaries, stabilize fuel supplies, and provide affordable prices for transit flights. Additionally, work is underway to optimize cargo operations, digitize processes, and introduce a special economic zone regime.
Karabayev also stated the need to modernize airport infrastructure. Plans include upgrading passenger and cargo terminals, fueling facilities, and runways and establishing an aircraft maintenance and repair center in Aktau. He clarified that it will repair aircraft from Russia and Central Asian countries.
“Its main advantage is its accessibility for all types of transport and proximity to Europe – only three hours by plane,” he said. These measures are expected to boost cargo handling capacity to 200,000 tons annually, and the annual turnover will reach 520 billion tenge (US$994.3 million).
Road infrastructure
Kazakhstan will reconstruct the Karagandy-Zhezkazgan highway in 2025, creating a new alternative route between Western Europe and Western China.
A major project to construct a 736-kilometer road connecting Beineu in the Mangystau Region and Sekseul in the Kyzylorda Region will start in 2027. This road will reduce travel distances to Aktau, Kuryk, and Turkmenistan ports by 900 kilometers, improving connectivity between southern and western regions.
New river port
Karabayev reported plans to establish a river port in the East Kazakhstan Region, creating a new multimodal transit corridor between China and Russia. Using the Yertis and Ob rivers, this corridor will link Kazakhstan to the Northern Seas.
The project includes opening a fourth railway checkpoint on the Chinese border and constructing 120 kilometers of railway to Tugyl. The annual transport capacity is projected to reach 2.5 million tons.
Seaports
Karabayev said one of the critical problems in Kazakhstan’s transport sector is the lack of a domestic fleet. Azerbaijani ferries dominate the Kuryk-Alat route, but Kazakhstan needs at least seven vessels. Turkish companies YDA and ASFAT plan to build a shipyard near Kuryk to address this gap.
The Aktau port’s container handling capacity will expand from 140,000 to 550,000 containers over the next three years. In the Mangystau region, a terminal for green hydrogen transport is also being developed.
Corridors
The infrastructure of the sea ports of Aktau and Kuryk impacts the development of two vital transit corridors: the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route (TITR) and the North-South corridor. Over four years, cargo volumes on the TITR have increased fivefold, from 800,000 tons to 4.1 million tons. Delivery times have dropped from 58-60 to 13-15 days.
The bulk of the cargo along the North-South corridor is generated in Russia and is intended for transportation to the Persian Gulf countries. This corridor’s capacity will increase from 23 to 33 trains per day. It is planned to modernize docking stations, form a single operator with Russia and Turkmenistan, and offer tariff discounts of up to 50%. These measures aim to double the corridor’s capacity and increase the volume to 20 million tons of cargo annually.