Cost of Uzbekistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan railway estimated at $7 billion

Uzbekistan, Afghanistan and Pakistan estimate the cost of construction of the Trans-Afghan railway at almost $7 billion, the press service of the Ministry of Transport reports.

Recently, the head of the Ministry of Transport, Ilkhom Mahkamov, held negotiations in Pakistan with local industry departments and large transport and logistics companies NLC-Logistics and TCS.

The Uzbekistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan railway construction project can be implemented through a PPP in the Build-Operate-Transfer format.

The parties also agreed to develop multimodal transportation along the Trans-Afghan corridor, reduce transportation fees, simplify cargo transportation and speed up the construction of a railway through Afghanistan.

The Trans-Afghan Highway initiative was launched in 2018. At that time, the project with an annual transportation potential of 20 million tons of cargo was estimated at $5 billion.

In July 2022, Uzbekistan Railways shared “Boshtransloyikha” calculations. The institute put the estimated cost of building the railway at $4.6 billion, and the project will take 5 years to complete.

Last December, Pakistan estimated the construction of the railway between Pakistan and Uzbekistan at $8.2 billion.