The Coordinating Council on Trans-Eurasian Transportation (CCTT) is a not-for-profit international transport association founded in 1993. Its purpose is to develop and coordinate international transport corridors between the countries of Southeast Asia, the Far and Middle East, Central Asia and Europe. The Chairman of the Council is Mr Oleg Belozerov, CEO of Russian Railways. UIC has been cooperating with CCTT for many years, and its collaborative relationships were strengthened by an MoU signed in 2012.
At the meeting, reports were provided on the implementation of the decisions of the 28th plenary session of the CCTT on improving the competitiveness of the East-West and North-South international transport corridors, development of multimodal transport in the Far East, information technology and harmonisation of international transport law.
The participants discussed the prospects for the development of railway corridors in Asia-Europe traffic, organisation and implementation of goods transport as part of container trains on this route, digitalisation of the transport process, development of the infrastructure and transport capacities of seaports to ensure uninterrupted organisation of multimodal transport in Eurasian traffic, as well as ensuring the safety of goods within the framework of the CCTT Security Train project.
The CCTT’s priority tasks aimed at increasing the competitiveness of trans-Eurasian transport were also identified during the meeting. They include organising full-scale information exchange for the development of clear and transparent cost conditions for goods delivery, establishing a single information space for trans-Eurasian transport, including through the implementation of the CCTT Integration Digital Platform project and the involvement of a maximum number of participants in the project, developing intelligent technology for monitoring international traffic cargo, increasing the speed of container trains across the EU, developing multimodal transport through ports, geographic expansion of the CIM/SMGS consignment note, and active marketing and promotion of trans-Eurasian rail transport using the Trans-Siberian Railway.
UIC was presented by the delegation led by Mr François Davenne, who highlighted successful cooperation in working groups for the development of information technology, the Electronic Train project, the Security Train project, electronic freight monitoring systems and the UIC BIRC group.
Transport multimodality for facilitation of freight, dissemination of IRSs in the freight sector, digital platform interoperability, and development and implementation of intelligent control systems were identified as prospective areas for further development of regional cooperation between UIC and CCTT.
UIC projects developed in cooperation with CCTT, members and other international organisations were presented, taking the examples of the ESI (electronic seal interoperability) project, use of Blockchain to secure document exchange, and the INTERTRAN project initiated by Russian Railways with the support of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP).
UIC’s study on the impact of Covid-19 is in line with observations provided by Mr Belozerov. During the pandemic, delivery time requirements for numerous goods - primarily personal protective equipment, medical supplies and equipment - have significantly increased, and the work of railway personnel in this area is now particularly important. The railways of China, Kazakhstan, Mongolia, Russia and Belarus have implemented a number of measures in this context which have made it possible to increase the average speed of transit container traffic to 1,000-1,100 km/day, while on the sections of the Russian Railways infrastructure, the goal is to increase delivery speed to 1,400 km/day. The delivery time for cargo from China to Europe is no more than 14 days, and is only five days on the 1,520 mm track section on the route through Kazakhstan.
The jubilee 30th plenary meeting of the CCTT is planned to be held in Bern, Switzerland, in 2021.
