The China Europe freight train is rising against the trend, expanding economic and trade exchanges between China and European countries
On August 21st, with the departure of the China Europe freight train (Xi'an Hamburg) from Xi'an International Port Station, the total number of China Europe freight trains operated this year has reached 10000, exceeding 10000 trains 10 days earlier than last year; This year, a total of 972000 TEUs of goods have been shipped, a year-on-year increase of 5%, with a comprehensive heavy container rate of 98.4%.
Since this year, faced with the impact of the COVID-19 and the international situation, the China EU train has shown more resilience and vitality, going against the trend. Despite being affected by the environment, the China Europe freight train still maintained above 1100 trains during the low period in the first half of the year, maintaining a high level in the past three years. Starting from May and June, the historical high of over 1300 trains was re established, and in July, growth continued to recover, reaching a new historical high with over 1517 trains operating. Container traffic volume increased by 14.9% month on month.
The high-quality development of China EU regular trains has built an all-weather, large volume, green, low-carbon, smooth and safe international logistics channel, optimized the regional opening pattern, expanded economic and trade exchanges between China and Europe, deepened international capacity cooperation, and provided strong support for maintaining the stability and smoothness of the international industrial chain supply chain and jointly building the "the Belt and Road" with high quality.
Expand new channels
On August 23rd, the first China Vietnam international freight train (Xi'an Hanoi) departed from Xi'an International Port Station, marking the opening of a land trade channel connecting Xi'an, Shaanxi and ASEAN. The regular operation of the China Europe freight train (Xi'an) has expanded to 17 main lines.
Our company has been importing asbestos from Central Asia and Russia to Vietnam for a long time. Previously, the first half of the transportation was by taking the China Europe freight train from Kazakhstan to Xi'an, land transportation to coastal ports, and then sea transportation, which took an average of 20 days to arrive in Vietnam. Now, relying on the international freight train (Xi'an Hanoi), the time has been shortened to 8 days, transportation time has been reduced by half, and logistics costs have been reduced by about 20%, providing a convenient and efficient trade channel for enterprises to further explore the ASEAN market, "said Zhao Jun, Deputy General Manager of Shaanxi Jiaotai Logistics Co., Ltd.
Since the beginning of this year, the railway department has actively explored many new transportation channels and routes. The China Europe Railway Express (Xi'an) has opened services such as the Xi'an St. Petersburg Mukland Mannheim and the first Japan South Korea transit car sea rail intermodal (cage car) train on the Asia Europe land sea trade corridor. The China Europe freight train (Xi'an) has 17 regular operating trunk lines, covering the entire Eurasian continent. In April of this year, Taiyuan Bureau Group Company launched the China Europe freight train from Zhongding Logistics Park to Erenhot and Mongolia (France) for the first time. The number of China Europe regular trains in Shanxi has increased to 9, radiating 27 cities in 12 countries along the "the Belt and Road".
The highly anticipated Yiwu China Europe Railway Express has also increased by 5 compared to two years ago, with 17 new operational transmission lines. Four branch offices and five logistics distribution centers have been established along the China Europe Railway Express, connecting 50 countries and 150 cities in the Eurasian continent. As of now, 100000 types of Chinese made goods from 15 provinces and cities including Shanghai, Jiangsu, Anhui, Guangdong, Shandong, and Hebei have taken the Yiwu China Europe freight train to "go global".
According to statistics, the Alashankou Port has added 22 new China Europe freight train routes this year, and the total number of China Europe freight train routes passing through the port has reached 87; 14 new routes have been opened through Khorgos Port, and with the addition of 35 new routes in 2021, the new routes have accounted for 70% of the total number of routes opened in two years.
"This year, new rail sea intermodal transport lines from Xi'an, Chongqing and other cities to Constanta, Romania via the Black Sea and Caspian Sea will be opened. China Europe trains will be closely connected with the China Laos railway international freight trains and the western land sea new channel trains, promoting the formation of an overseas channel network pattern of" unimpeded, efficient, multi-directional extension, and sea land connectivity ". The head of the freight department of the China Railway Group introduced that the joint working group mechanism of the seven country railway China Europe train transport will be fully used to strengthen cooperation with the railway departments of countries along the line in transport organization, information sharing, equipment and infrastructure construction, and improve the efficiency of international intermodal transport.
Capacity expansion and blockage breaking point
In the 11 year development process, the China Europe freight train has gradually become an important international logistics channel in China and a globally recognized Chinese logistics business card. However, the China Europe freight train still faces many contradictions in its development, and port congestion has become a long-term bottleneck in its operation, "said Li Muyuan, Executive Vice President and Secretary General of the China Container Industry Association.
In Xinjiang, the number of trains running at Alataw Pass and Khorgos railway ports accounts for more than 50% of the number of trains running nationwide. Since 2020, in order to match the growing demand for freight transport, Alataw Pass and Khorgos railway ports have continuously implemented capacity expansion and reconstruction projects. After the capacity expansion and reconstruction of Khorgos Station, 1 pair of cargo reloading lines and 10 arrival and departure lines have been added and extended in the site, and the capacity of train transportation organization has been improved by more than 30%. Alashankou Station is steadily advancing its environmental protection renovation project, and it is expected that after being put into use within the year, it will increase its daily capacity to transport more than 5 sets of bulk cargo.
At the same time, the expansion and renovation of the Erenhot Railway Port officially began in June 2022, marking the fourth large-scale expansion and renovation in history. On August 11th, the expansion and renovation of the Erenhot Railway Port was completed, increasing the number of wide gauge train lines from 18 to 30. The number of outbound trains at the port increased from 7 to 8 per day, and the number of inbound trains increased from 14 to 17 per day, significantly improving the capacity of inbound and outbound trains. After the renovation, the newly built Erenhot Station Dispatch Command Center will achieve a centralized control and transportation organization mode of "four occasions and one" for wide gauge field, standard gauge field, wheel changing warehouse, and border inspection field, providing sufficient transportation capacity guarantee for the efficient operation of China Europe freight trains.
According to Qin Zhicang from the Passenger and Freight Management Department of Erenhot Railway Port, in the past 10 years, the number of China Europe freight trains that have been transported has increased from "single digits" to "five digits". It took more than 8 years to complete the first 5000 trains, and less than 2 years to break through the 10000 train mark. With the premise of resolutely doing a good job in epidemic prevention and control at the port, it has achieved counter trend growth.
"Since this year, we have steadily promoted the implementation of the capacity expansion and reconstruction projects of ports and rear channels such as Alashankou, Khorgos, Manzhouli, Erlianhot, and actively coordinated with overseas railways to synchronously improve the infrastructure capacity, achieving a steady increase in the capacity of domestic and foreign channels." The person in charge introduced that the average daily traffic volume of the China Europe Corridor in Banliexi, Central and East increased by 20.7%, 15.2%, and 41.3% respectively from 2020 before the capacity expansion and reconstruction.
Generate new business models
"At the beginning of this year, affected by the Russia-Ukraine conflict and the spread of domestic epidemic, the China Europe Express (Zhengzhou) still maintained stable operation and healthy development, and was praised by many customers." Kong Weidong, general manager of the Zhengzhou Branch of Shanghai Taihua Freight Forwarding Co., Ltd., said that the advantage of the China Europe Express (Zhengzhou) is that it can directly transport goods to European inland cities. At the same time, in the environment of soaring international oil prices, the inland transportation also helped customers save a lot of truck transportation costs. Especially in the last two months, the China Europe Express (Zhengzhou) has "burst" again, and a box is hard to find.
In recent years, China Railway Zhengzhou Bureau Group Co., Ltd. has built an "online silk road" based on Henan Province, implemented the strategy of "integration of transportation and trade", innovated the Internet sales model, established an e-commerce platform of "train purchase" and offline physical exhibition and sales experience center relying on the train, introduced enterprises from inside and outside the province to settle, and introduced the "online+offline" sales model, which to a certain extent guaranteed the "stock out" operation of the return China Europe Train (Zhengzhou).
The new business model of connecting logistics and commerce is gradually being applied by the China Europe freight train platform enterprises. Relying on the increasingly dense international logistics network of the China Europe freight train, the China Europe freight train has extended from front-end transportation to the end consumer market, giving birth to a new business model of connecting logistics and commerce. "Li Muyuan pointed out that the proportion of cross-border e-commerce goods in the China Europe freight train is gradually increasing, and postal freight trains are running smoothly. Some freight train enterprises have begun to provide cross-border e-commerce logistics services to e-commerce practitioners, not only expanding the return goods of the China Europe freight train, but also expanding the trade service attributes of the China Europe freight train.
During the epidemic, the Xuzhou China Europe Railway Express and Xuzhou Customs innovatively promoted the "railway fast customs clearance", significantly improving the efficiency of train operation and reducing logistics costs; Exploring the operation of the Xuzhou Lianyungang rail sea intermodal "railway box sewer" mode trains with the railway department, effectively helping enterprises overcome epidemic road control and smooth sea routes, promoting new operating models such as "train+city procurement" with the Xuzhou Municipal Bureau of Commerce, and serving the export of small and micro enterprises.
Since the beginning of this year, the railway department has improved the quality of transportation services, coordinated and utilized the capabilities of various channels, reasonably arranged operation plans, fully utilized port handover capabilities, expanded international full logistics services, increased the organization of return trains, and promoted balanced transportation of two-way goods. This year, the ratio of return trains to outbound trains has reached 88%, "said the person in charge of the freight department of China Railway Group.
At present, the China Europe freight train has laid out 82 operating routes, reaching 200 cities in 24 countries in Europe, gradually "connecting points into lines" and "weaving lines into networks". The transportation service network covers the whole of Europe, transporting goods in 53 categories including clothing, shoes, hats, cars and accessories, grain, wood, and more than 50000 categories.
