OREANDA-NEWS. The creation of the rail corridor follows the signing of a memorandum of understanding (MOU) between DHL and Kazakhstan Temir Zholy Express (KTZ Express), Kazakhstan's national multimodal operator, facilitating great rail connectivity between Europe and China via Kazakhstan's commercial hubs, including the newly-created Khorgos Special Economic Zone. DHL also worked very closely with China, Azerbaijan and Georgia Railways, Karvan Logistics and RTSB Logistics alongside the governments of all three countries of transit, as well as Lianyungang's municipal government, garnering their full support of the rail corridor's operation.

"Trade between China and countries along the Silk Road has grown 19 percent every year on averagefor the past decade, and the establishment of One Belt, One Road will only further ignite these already-high volumes of economic activity," said Steve Huang, CEO, DHL Global Forwarding China. "Turkey already counts China as its second-largest source of imports, and the EU as its largest export market. New corridors like the Lianyungang-Istanbul link will only further boost Turkey's strategic importance and associated economic development as a conduit for trade between China and Europe."

"A flexible, comprehensive service network creates greater reliability and efficiency for our customers under all sorts of conditions, no matter the origin or destination of their freight," said Charles Kaufmann, CEO, North Asia; and Head of Value Added Services, DHL Global Forwarding Asia Pacific. "As the One Belt, One Road initiative takes shape, DHL has already begun laying down much of the infrastructure and support needed to ensure seamless trade flows between all countries along its routes."

The rail corridor, which is also supported by a contingency trucking service between Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey, complements DHL Global Forwarding's three existing services via its North and West multimodal corridors, which most recently expanded to connect Taiwan with Europe via China.