At its seventy-seventh session, held last year, week in Geneva, the Working Party on Rail Transport of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) adopted the Convention on the Contract for International Carriage of Goods, which provides, among other things, for unified transport standards along the Eurasian corridors, which So far, it has not been covered by a framework on this route in contrast to road transport, which is subject to the Convention on the Contract of International Carriage of goods (CMR), to maritime transport, which is subject to the Hague-Visby Rules and air transport which is covered by the Montreal Convention.

"The adoption of this new Convention - he stressed Tatiana Molcean, Executive Secretary of UNECE - will bring the long-distance rail freight transport on a with other means of transport, offering countries and To logistics companies, renewed options. In addition, given that the Rail freight emitting 5.7 times less greenhouse gases compared to road transport on the basis of tonne-kilometre, this is good news for climate action, especially ten days before the opening COP28'.

With the introduction of a single legal framework, which will cover multimodal transport operations, International Rail Freight will be released from being subject to multiple rules, it will be reduced bureaucracy by, for example, the use of a single letter and will be subject to a single Responsibility extended to the entire transport chain to cover losses, damage and delays and therefore applicable to all railway companies participating in the end-to-end transport and to their customers.

UNECE has highlighted the significant increase in transport rail freight between China and Europe has recorded in the in recent years, despite the obstacles arising from the lack of a combined legal regime, with volumes transported by rail which, in the In 2022, they totaled more than 400 thousand TEU containers.

After the approval of the Working Group on Rail Transport of the last week, the Convention will be forwarded to Inland UNECE Transport Committee, which will convene its Transport Committee in February next session to give the green light to the signing of the Convention by States.