IMEC: More Than Just A Corridor – Analysis
The proposed IMEC corridor connecting India to Europe through the Gulf can be transformative, helping to reduce risks to the global movement of goods and data. It’s early days yet, and there are gaps to be filled in terms of missing infrastructure and overcoming a diplomatic rift.
By Amit Bhandari and Sifra Lentin
IMEC is a multimodal corridor that originates in India and ends in Europe. Goods from India arrive at ports in the UAE, and are carried on trains that traverse the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Jordan to Israel’s Haifa Port. From Haifa, it proceeds to ports in Greece, Italy, and France. The objective of IMEC is to provide a faster and safer transit for goods, energy, and data between India and Europe. It is expected to bring down transit time between India and Europe by 30%, and cut, by 40%, the cost of logistics[2]. IMEC also offers a safer trading alternative by bypassing the Red Sea Route.
While the IMEC has been compared to China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), it is remarkably different. BRI is a single-country initiative, whose goal is to create a China-centric global trading network. Launched in 2013, the BRI has seen investments of over $1 trillion so far, much of it debt, from China[3]. It has also run into controversy, with accusations of pushing poor countries into a debt trap, and saddling them with white elephants. In India’s neighbourhood, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Nepal are held up as examples of this debt trap diplomacy. Many African countries, including Kenya, Zambia, and Angola, are deeply in debt to China through the BRI.
In contrast, the IMEC is a multilateral corridor, with projects along the route being funded locally. For instance, India is investing in upgrading its port infrastructure. Saudi Arabia has pledged $20 billion worth of investments for IMEC by upgrading its domestic rail and port infrastructure[4]. The UAE will build a rail link to the Saudi border, which will connect to the Saudi rail network.
The IMEC corridor is particularly important for Saudi Arabia which is hemmed in by the Houthis in the Red Sea and Iran in the Persian Gulf, through which its primary export, oil, runs. Under its youthful leader Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud, Saudi Arabia has been reforming socially, infrastructurally, and strategically. Economically, tt needs access not only to the Arabian Sea for passage of its oil, to Asia, but also to the Mediterranean, for its European buyers. At home, the country is diversifying its internal economy which will require better connectivity with these markets.
The drop in shipping in the Suez Canal is a financial cost for transporters, whose ships now take the longer route around the Cape of Good Hope. However, this is just a financial cost – while it makes commerce more expensive, it doesn’t stop trade altogether.
For data, however, it is a serious cost. Data, on which modern economies depend, is carried by sub-sea optic fibre cables which cannot be rerouted. Much of the global data cable network passes through the Red Sea and the Suez Canal – and this network is vulnerable to disruption. For instance, a Chinese ship was accused of deliberately damaging sub-sea cables in the Baltic Sea in November 2024, by dragging its anchor along the seabed[5]. Such an action in the Red Sea region can cripple the global digital economy. IMEC offers an alternative: optic fibre cables can be laid on land, along the railway route connecting Jebel Ali to Haifa, reducing vulnerability of the existing infrastructure.
Strategically, IMEC is a corridor built on the foundations of the 2020 Abraham Accords, aimed at normalising ties between Israel and the Arab States. The Abraham Accords were signed during the first Trump administration, between the U.S., UAE, Bahrain, Morocco, Sudan and Israel. Most significant for IMEC was Israel and the U.A.E. establishing diplomatic ties under the Accords in 2020, with Saudi Arabia, due to follow. This has been stalled by the Gaza war. India’s participation is through the I2U2, a grouping conceived in 2021 with India, Israel, the U.S. and the U.A.E. as members identifying public-private partnerships for joint investment.
For India, IMEC is a winner all around. It gives India the chance to be part of a global standards infrastructure project. The first port of call is the UAE, India’s fourth-largest trade partner with which it has just signed a comprehensive trade agreement and which hosts 10% of India’s diaspora. It requires a major upgrade in its port infrastructure, which has already begun. The Vadhavan Port which will be India’s largest container port, is one of the origination points of the IMEC along with the Mundra Port in Gujarat. It is part of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Sagarmala project, linking up with the geopolitical Mahasagar plan to bring India closer to its maritime neighbours such as Mauritius and Sri Lanka and its closest trading partners like Dubai.
While IMEC appears to be a shiny new plan, it is in fact, not a new route for India. The IMEC corridor predates the old Red Sea route, which became a viable alternative to the well-established Persian Gulf route only after Roman rule in Egypt from 30 BCE ensured security for shipping across the length of the Red Sea channel. [6]
Since the Bronze Age, and till the late 19th century, the main trunk route for Indian trade was the Persian Gulf. This included the Basra-Baghdad upriver route to the Mediterranean, which once passed overland through Petra (Jordan) and Palmyra (Syria) to touch Eastern Mediterranean shores. It also encompassed the ports of ancient Dilmun (Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar) and Magan (UAE, Oman, and possibly, the Makran coast).
The ancient hinterland had a network of caravan routes across the Arabian Peninsula. Aromatics and elements like frankincense and myrrh[7], gold, diorite, copper, and crystalline semi-precious stones like carnelians were export commodities from this region.Indian merchants known as Meluhans, are mentioned in the Akkadian King Sargon’s cuneiform of 2300 BCE. Indians settled across the littoral of the Persian Gulf and supplied Malabar pepper, spices, cotton cloth, and indigo, from the Subcontinent’s west coast. It is this old network of ports, caravanserai, and traders, that is coalescing to make up the new IMEC.
This rich, established legacy augurs well for the new 21st century corridor, but there are challenges to achieving this goal. Although every country that has signed on to IMEC has assigned an ambassador specially for it, there is no blueprint to follow. According to Dammu Ravi, Secretary MEA, Economic Relations, the crisis in the Middle East is a test for the project[8]. Right now, IMEC faces three hurdles – the inadequate port infrastructure in India, the missing railway links in West Asia and the diplomatic gap between Saudi Arabia and Israel. A related challenge is ensuring the timely completion of projects and coordination between signatory nations.
The good news is that all-important interoperability of IMEC logistics is already under way. Next step: setting up an IMEC secretariat to ensure that this modern, multi-country corridor proceeds in physical form, and helps bridge the diplomatic deficit.
- Amit Bhandari is Senior Fellow for Energy, Investment and Connectivity.
- Sifra Lentin is Fellow, Bombay History, Gateway House.
This article was written for Gateway House: Indian Council on Global Relations.
References:
[1] https://www.pib.gov.in/PressReleaseIframePage.aspx?PRID=1955921
[2] https://www.pib.gov.in/PressReleasePage.aspx?PRID=2122299
[3]https://english.news.cn/20231229/8c658fa0ef2e4d4fab25a056b2d5c46c/c.html#:~:text=
Over%20the%20past%20decade%2C%20Belt,jobs%20for%20the%20participating%20countries.
[6] Shipping along the Red Sea route began under the Ptolemaic rule of Egypt from about 300 BCE. Ptolemaic Egypt was a Greek polity founded in 305 BCE by the Macedonian General Ptolemy I Soter, and ruled by his dynasty till the death of Cleopatra VII in 30 BCE. It was Roman rule after 30 BCE that made this a secure route and thereby made it a viable alternative to the Persian Gulf route. See https://www.gatewayhouse.in/the-ancient-precursor-to-imec/#_ftnref4
[7] Incense was sourced from the Southern Arabian Peninsula.
