2024-07-14 04:45:47
Deputy of the “Armenia” faction of the National Assembly Artur Khachatryan reminded that Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan spoke at one of his press conferences about the economic validity of the already agreed Yeraskh-Julfa-Ordubad-Meghri-Horadiz railway and the expected revenues from the transit.
The deputy asked to be informed about the payback period of the investment, the expected profitability, the expected tax revenues, the expected passenger and cargo transportation, including transit flows, and the cost of construction in 20 years.
“The government has effectively approved a $226 million project without estimating the project’s profitability,” he said.
RA Deputy Prime Minister Mher Grigoryan also announced that at the moment the decisions were made on the basis of indicative numbers and in-depth calculations should be carried out.
“In order for us to understand the volume of investments, first of all, we need to have the final project with all its details. Today, including foreign experts, the approximate cost of the restoration of that wing will be 226-230 million dollars and the duration will be up to 36 months. In terms of freight alone, we have an average size of 3 million without de-blocking, of which 2 are domestic freight. If we see the tax revenues of “South Caucasian Railway” today, they amount to 4.7 billion, and if we calculate that the flows will at least double in the event of de-blocking, we arrive at a minimum yield of 5 percent, which is not bad,” said the RA Deputy Prime Minister.
He said that this allows us to enter the next stage and carry out more in-depth calculations and projects, as a result of which the numbers will be adjusted.
According to the Deputy Prime Minister, the North-South direction of the project has serious potential and this is obvious even in the geographical sense.