Chengdu plans to launch pan-Asia train service
Chengdu, a megacity in southwestern China, plans to launch a pan-Asia train service linking it with countries of the Indochina Peninsula in 2021, according to a five-year action plan (2017-2021) on construction of the Chengdu International Railway Port recently issued, scol.com.cn reported.
The train stations will be set up in Southeast Asian countries including Vietnam, Myanmar, Thailand and Singapore.
Chengdu, capital city of Sichuan, rolled out the Chengdu-Europe Plus strategy in 2016, with the aim of becoming a transportation hub between Europe and pan-Asia by expanding its international railway network.
In the five years between 2017 and 2021, Chengdu will make more efforts to ensure the regular round-trip operation of the China Railway Express freight train services connecting it with Europe, and expand the Chengdu-Lodz route to Nuremberg, Germany and Tilburg, the Netherlands.
Chengdu has launched freight train services to Istanbul, the capital of Turkey, Lodz in Poland, and Minsk, capital of Belarus. Chengdu intends to become the No. 1 international railway port in China in 2021, according to the plan.
The number of trains running between Chengdu and foreign cities is expected to reach 3,000 a year by 2021, from last year’s 500. The international train services are expected to bring about US$28 billion in trade and help the province to generate more than 200 billion yuan (US$30 billion) in output value .
The Chengdu-Europe express rail will set up stations in more than ten foreign cities and be expanded to more than ten domestic cities.
The first batch of pork transported by international freight train from Germany to China arrived in Chengdu in 2016, marking the opening of the railway channel for China to import meat products from Europe.
