OREANDA-NEWS. August 04, 2010. Sergey Kogoghin, Director General of OJSC KAMAZ has visited Turkmenistan’s capital Ashgabat as a member of Tatarstan’s delegation headed by Rustam Minnikhanov, Tatarstan’s President.

Tatarstan’s delegation included Cabinet Ministers and general directors of Tatarstan’s largest enterprises. Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov, Turkmenistan’s President met with Rustam Minnikhanov, and later received Tatarstan’s delegation in his residence. According to RIA Novosti, at this meeting Mr. Berdymukhamedov said that Turkmenistan planned to purchase more than one thousand vehicles and units of special equipment bearing the trademark of KAMAZ. “We thank you for your support rendered to KAMAZ at the most difficult time,” Rustam Minnikhanov said in answer. “We always tell about it, and KAMAZ is ready to work further for the benefit of your country.”

Development of cooperation with Turkmenistan was always of priority importance for KAMAZ’s foreign-economic activity. Since the time when independence was declared and especially for the last 4 years the brotherly country has turned into one of the largest consumers of automobile equipment bearing the trademark of KAMAZ. The company has the widest line of production models and special equipment for all economic sectors and is ready to satisfy its users’ almost all requirements.

To date Turkmenistan’s fleet of KAMAZ vehicles numbers about 8 thousand units. KAMAZ became a dominating supplier of trucks, and Turkmenistan became the best exporter of KAMAZ’s production in 2009. At the height of the global economic crisis the fraternal country was KAMAZ’s only importer which managed to maintain the level of purchases of the year 2008.

In 2007-2010 KAMAZ realized over 4500 units of equipment in Turkmenistan, including a whole number of dumpers, heavy and all-wheel drive vehicles, and also the whole gamut of special equipment on KAMAZ chassis. The customers of KAMAZ’s production are the ministries of the country’s oil-and-gas complex, the ministry of defence, the ministry of motor transport, etc. The average kilometrage of the new vehicles has already formed 200 thousand km (about 124,274 miles). The coefficient of operation of the trucks makes 0.9 which indicates high reliability of KAMAZ equipment under hard usage conditions in deserts and mountains.

In response to large-scale investment projects and high dynamics of development of the country’s basic economic sectors, considering Turkmenistan’s potential demand for trucks, KAMAZ offers consumers the whole range of trucks, high level of service and efficient parts supply investing development of its commodity distribution and service network in Turkmenistan.

In 2006 ZAO Foreign-Trade Company KAMAZ opened its representative office in Ashgabat – KAMAZ FTC Corp. In July 2007 Training and Service Center KAMAZ was put into operation. Volume of investment in its construction made up 8 billion US dollars. The center is fitted out with modern equipment and intended for maintenance of 1000 vehicles a year. 150 people work there. The Turkmen specialists were trained at the center to operate special equipment produced by the main Russian plants. Besides, the Turkmen drivers operating KAMAZ vehicles with Cummins engines and ZF gearboxes were trained there, and also at KAMAZ’s production base in Naberezhnye Chelny. A spare parts store was established on the territory of Training and Service Center KAMAZ in Ashgabat. There are service centers in Balkanabat, Mary, Daєoguz, and Turkmenabat as well.

OJSC KAMAZ makes its contribution to training of technicians for Turkmenistan in other industries too. In compliance with the agreements reached, a group of students from Turkmenistan is now being trained at the expense of OJSC KAMAZ at the automotive department of Kama State Engineering and Economics Academy in Naberezhnye Chelny, 6 future specialists more are completing the formalities. In May 2009 a metallurgical works was opened in Ovadan-Depe (near Ashgabat). This is a firstling of Turkmenistan’s big metallurgy. In September 2009 the Turkmen party handed over the technical administration of the enterprise to KAMAZ. In October pilot production was started at the plant by KAMAZ jointly with the Turkmen experts. Within 9 months 37 thousand tonnes of workpieces were made, 24 thousand tonnes of accessories and 10 thousand tonnes of shapes were produced. The metallurgical production has reached the rate of 10 melts a day.