To offer expected time savings of 40 per cent with a 30 per cent reduction in the cost of trade, the first pilot transports under TIR (Transports Internationaux Routiers or International Road Transport) between India and Iran along International North South Transport Corridor (INSTC) have been set for early 2018 at strategic talks recently held in Mumbai. The two-day meeting gathered 20 high level representatives from India and Iran’s transport industry as well as representatives from Customs. The goal of the meeting was to discuss the implementation of TIR and to establish cooperation between representatives of the public and private sectors in order to activate the use of TIR along the INSTC.
Also, during a visit to the port of Mumbai, the Indian Ambassador to Iran, Dr. Saurabh Kumar, highlighted the strategic importance of the INSTC corridor as well as Chabahar port in Iran. He welcomed the discussions between the public and private sectors of the two countries on how to facilitate transport and transit along this corridor, in particular by using TIR.
INSTC is a multimodal transport corridor conceived in 2000 by India, Iran and Russia – offering significant trade prospects for all three countries. Later INSTC was expanded to include 10 new members: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Oman, Syria, Tajikistan, Turkey and Ukraine.
