China's landmark trade corridor cargo volume surges

NANNING, Nov. 5 (Xinhua) -- A freight train carrying 80 containers of goods, including Australian kraft paper and Singaporean puff pastry shortening, departed from Qinzhou Port East Station in south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region on Wednesday, bound for Chongqing Municipality in southwest China.

The shipment marks a significant milestone, with the cumulative freight volume of the New International Land-Sea Trade Corridor rail service reaching 1.214 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) so far this year, a 63.2 percent increase from the same period last year.

Serving as a crucial logistics link between China's western inland regions and global markets, the corridor has enabled new energy vehicles produced in Chongqing and Guangxi to reach Middle Eastern markets through a combined rail-sea transport mode, helped Chinese agricultural products enter international markets, and allowed ASEAN imports such as Thai durians and Cambodian rice to arrive in Chongqing in just 88 hours via dedicated cold chain trains.

Wei Wenkang, head of Qinzhou Port East Station, said that the station's freight dispatch volume has continued to grow this year. "So far, the total volume has reached 7.164 million tonnes, up 18.7 percent year on year, with daily loading and unloading records broken 12 times," Wei added.

Data show that since 2021, the New Western Land-Sea Corridor has transported a total of 4.441 million TEUs of goods, solidifying its role as a key logistics artery linking western China with ASEAN countries and driving coordinated regional development while deepening opening up to global markets. ■