Logistics market update: December 2025

Kazakhstan's aviation industry has received an ICAO certification with a 95.7% compliance rating with international safety standards. This result significantly exceeds the global average (72.01%) and the European average (87.92%). By comparison, in Uzbekistan, where civil aviation has shown significant growth in recent years, the compliance rate is 85.47%.

The ICAO audit may help attract new international players to the Kazakhstan market, we will see during 2026.

In October 2025, KTZ Air Cargo, a subsidiary of KTZ Express, was registered in Astana – KTZ Express was the first company in Kazakhstan to engage in air cargo transportation. A June 2025 Government announcement confirmed commencement of flights in the first half of 2026. It was also reported at the time that the company would lease three aircraft initially, with the fleet later expanding to 10 aircraft. WELLGO are confident that KTZ AirCargo will improve the quality of its aviation solutions for the Kazakhstan market in 2026.

2025 saw some new beginnings in the Air market. The last airline to launch in 2025 is Thai Air Asia X. The 1^st December saw the launch of wide-body Airbus A330 flights between Almaty and Bangkok, four times weekly with destinations in Southeast Asia, particularly Japan and South Korea.

Thai Air AsiaX not only provides imports from Southeast Asia, but can handle exports to other Asian countries.

December traditionally remains the busiest month for European air travel. In the lead-up to the Christmas holidays, demand soars, followed by higher rates and longer transit times.

This year, increased capacity pressure has been felt since mid-November, with the peak season for Western and Central Europe shipments to occur in the second half of December.

In Southern Europe, we predict the peak will begin a week earlier. The situation is also affected by the December 8th holidays in Italy and Spain and flight cancellations. Turkish Airlines removed one Milan-Istanbul flight from its schedule in the first week of December. This resulted in a shift in the shipment plan and an increase in transit time.

We recommend prior planning, consult WELLGO and consider more urgent rates to avoid delays.

Demand for air travel from China also significantly exceeds supply. Rates began to rise in the third week of November, seats are quickly filling up, and airlines are warning of possible cancellation penalties.

The recommendations remain the same as for Europe: early booking and prompt coordination of priority shipments. Contact WELLGO for details.

In November, a meeting of the Intergovernmental Commission on Cooperation between Kazakhstan and Russia was held in Astana, where a number of transport issues were discussed. These included increasing the volume of rail transport, developing the North-South International Corridor, and problems for Kazakhstani road carriers related to changes in Russian immigration legislation.

Normally, foreigners are only allowed 90 days per calendar year (was 180), regardless of the number of entries and exits, drivers included. Following the meeting, the Russian side expressed its willingness to rescind the changes for Kazakhstani drivers. We hope this will alleviate concerns among our carriers when operating on Russian routes.

Following the closure of the Polish-Belarusian border (September 12–25) and the Lithuanian-Belarusian border crossings (October 29–November 20), traffic has resumed as normal. Furthermore, Poland has opened additional crossing points, which has had a positive impact on throughput.

Queues are shortening: in early December, the wait was around two days. However, the seasonal increase will continue to reduce the availability of transport options, with some increase in delays possible. Contact WELLGO for further updates.

The Caspian Sea leg of the central corridor is in the midst of storm season, with high winds. Despite the deployment of additional vessels undergoing repairs, sea service is frequently interrupted due to weather conditions.
Northern route (via Russia):

Autumn inspections at the China-Kazakhstan border led to a partial re-routing of transit flows through the Chinese-Russian checkpoints. As a result, road transport from China to Kazakhstan did not experience a significant increase in transit time in November. Current status of queues at major border crossings: