In 1Q25, port cargo turnover increased, while railway cargo decreased. In the first three months of the year, Georgian ports and terminals processed 3 million 709 thousand tons of cargo, which is an annual increase of 9.2%.
The volume of cargo transported by railways decreased by 7% in three months and amounted to 3 million tons.
As the General Director of Kairos Logistics stated to BMG, the railway freight decrease in the first quarter is likely due to bad weather conditions in neighboring countries, which delayed cargo receipt in Georgia.
The company assumes that a growth trend in rail cargo will be observed during the year, although they note that a lot of work should be done to maintain cargo in the Georgian transport corridor.
“The weather also significantly impacts transportation, including delays due to a storm in the Caspian Sea. We received some containers that we were supposed to receive in the first quarter in April. The same can be said about the railway direction. We have delayed the orders that we were supposed to fulfill in February-March, and in the case of rail cargo, this also caused delays; there were delays of about 3-4 weeks. Therefore, I would wait until the end of the year, we expect that there will still be growth during the year. Maybe not as much as there were two years ago, but the stable trend will be maintained.
As for internal challenges, in the case of railways, locomotives naturally need to be added; among the challenges are also speed and throughput. As for maritime infrastructure, we need a large port to receive Panamax-type ships. We also need competition, because we have the most expensive ports in the Black Sea and the Mediterranean Sea," said Mikheil Namadov.
