By Xinyi Li, iChongqing News

Chongqing- On the morning of April 10, a freight train carrying 25 containers of automotive components, which worth more than RMB 8 million, departed from Tuanjiecun Railway Station of Chongqing to the Port of Qinzhou in Guangxi, and finally arrived in India by marine freighters. It is an extension of the developement of the rail-sea inter-modal transport platform of New International Land-Sea Trade Corridor (ILSTC). Moreover, it means that it can meet customers’ delivery needs of “customized” special trains and provide more diversified land-sea transport services in addition to serving the majority of market entities for a small batch of space-booking.

On April 10, a freight train departed from Chongqing finally arrived in India by marine freighters

Wang Yupei, Chairman of China-Singapore Southward Channel (Chongqing) Logistics Development Co., Ltd. introduced, “This special train will get to Qinzhou within two days, and finally arrive in India by marine freighters. It only takes about 20 days in total, which is 14 days less than the duration of the river-sea inter-modal transport. All parts of the world are expected to see more Chinese exports via special trains in the future.”

The fast-growing finished automobiles and parts logistics enable China’s automobile enterprises to establish a relatively stable cooperative relationship with ILSTC in rail-sea inter-modal transport. Such an efficient and convenient transportation mode can also be copied to other industries and fields. Therefore, it allows more and more products made in China to go out. Meanwhile, it can also help an increasing number of Chinese enterprises to improve logistics efficiency and reduce production costs, as well as promote industrial transformation and upgrading.

There have been 875 trains operating via ILSTC for rail-sea trade since their opening on April 28, 2017, covering 464 up trains and 411 down ones. The cumulative value of foreign trade goods reaches about USD 430 million and that of domestic trade goods being about RMB 2.31 billion. With the destinations covering 166 ports of 71 countries and regions in 6 continents, the main products include more than 30 varieties of 8 categories, such as finished automobiles and parts, architectural pottery, chemical raw materials and products, light industrial and pharmaceutical products (beverage), grain, and fresh-frozen goods.