Beijing, 15 March 2023 (TDI): The recent arrival of a China-Europe freight train marks the two-way opening of trade in the eastern highway and rail intermodal hub of Guangzhou.
The train, loaded with 102 containers from Europe, arrived at a logistics park in the Zengcheng district on March 6, 2023, and returned to the railway logistics park on Sunday.
It carried 1,275 metric tons of corrugated paper and other goods for import and export-oriented companies based in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area.
Moreover, the train took 17 days to travel from Central Europe, entering China via the port of Alataw Pass in the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region, and traveling more than 10,000 kilometers.
Notably, the two-way connection of the China-Europe freight train is a fast and safe logistics channel, helping significantly to shorten the transportation time of import and export goods and effectively reducing the logistics cost.
On the other side, “the demand for import and export goods has increased significantly in the Bay Area, following the optimization and adjustment of the COVID-19 control policy,” according to Xu Hongzhan, a Manager at Guangzhou Dashunfa International Logistics.
As this is a welcome development for local trade enterprises and the operation of the two-way international logistics channel of China-Europe trains will soon be normalized at the logistics park.
Moreover, the city’s highway and railway intermodal center is set to become an international train hub in the Bay Area, according to China Railway Guangzhou Group.
As a matter of fact, the intermodal transport hub is a major national construction project and one of the four national-level logistics hubs in Guangzhou.
It has launched 20 international logistics lines to Europe, Central Asia, and Southeastern Asia, since its freight train service to Germany began in July 2021.
Also, it has become the most frequent international train departure hub in the Greater Bay Area, running five to seven China-Europe trains and one to two China-Laos freight trains weekly.
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Regarding its purpose, the railway group said, “it would work with local customs and transportation authorities to facilitate construction of the first phase of the highway-rail intermodal transport hub and continue to improve the transport logistics network system.
After completion of the first phase project, the highway-rail intermodal transport hub is expected to become the largest logistics hub for production and services in the Bay Area, helping Guangzhou to accelerate the construction of an international modern logistics and consumption center.
The cross-border freight train linking China and Europe connects 108 Chinese cities and 208 cities in 25 European countries, according to China State Railway Group, the national railway operator.
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