MINSK (BelTA) — According to preliminary calculations the United Transport and Logistics Company (UTLC) of Russia, Belarus, and Kazakhstan will transfer about $3 mln to Belarusian Railways for services rendered in 2015, BelTA learned from UTLC President Piotr Baskakov on 7 October.

Belarusian Railways is expected to get about $3 mln in 2015 for container transit between China and Europe via Belarus within the framework of the United Transport and Logistics Company. About $1.6 mln has been transferred already. In his words, this year transit transportation between China and Europe is expected to reach 60,000 containers in 20-foot container terms, i.e. twice the last year’s volume (30,000 containers).

The national railway operators of Russia, Kazakhstan, and Belarus signed the agreement on setting up the United Transport and Logistics Company (UTLC) in June 2013. The public joint-stock company (OAO) United Transport and Logistics Company was registered by the universal state registry of corporations in Moscow on 13 November 2014. The charter capital of the new company was RUB39.7 bln.

The companies responsible of this transportation in 2014 are now part of the UTLC group. “They use our unified technology. The approach has allowed us to offer attractive rates to clients by reducing internal costs. While fees for using the Belarusian Railways infrastructure are unchanged, Belarus will get double the amount of money this year in comparison with last year thanks to higher transit traffic”, noted the UTLC head.

The consolidated business system of the UTLC group of companies is being created now. The operational model for the group has been approved. Participants of the project now share a common view of how they will interact, how authority and competences will be distributed.

UTLC takes care of transporting cargoes in containers in the Single Economic Space, including in transit between Europe and Asia. Thanks to the project’s implementation Belarus intends to increase transit container traffic by 4.5 times. Container processing by the railway station Brest North is supposed to rise by 6.8 times. About $25 mln will be invested in the development of the terminal and warehouse infrastructure. In spring 2015 Russian Railways President Vladimir Yakunin stated that UTLC services are in demand. In his words, the first contract has been signed with the world’s top logistic company DHL.

BelTA recently quoted Belarusian First Deputy Transport and Communications Minister Yevgeny Rogachev as saying that the first stage of the project to create the United Transport and Logistics Company was about to end on time. In the near future the Kazakh side is supposed to transfer its own contribution and honour its own commitments.