Responding to rising trade volumes, Zhengzhou in Central China has started a rail service to Hamburg, Germany. The train takes 18 days to make the 10,214-kilometer trip, more than twice as fast as maritime transport. It can also effectively save 80% of the cost compared with air shipments, and it is also cheaper compared with road transportation. The route reaches Germany via Kazakhstan, Russia, Belarus and Poland. Zhengzhou International Inland Port Development Co is responsible for cooperating with partner rail companies in each country. The containers have to be transferred by crane to different gauges twice. First comes a change to the Russian style broad gauge line at the Kazakhstan-China border at Alashankou, in Xinjiang. The second is a transfer to the standard gauge at the Polish-Belarusian border. DB Schenker, the transport and logistics arm of Deutsche Bahn, is the rail route’s main partner outside China. It provides gauge transfers and technical services through its service network in Central Asia and East Europe after the trains leave China. The Railway Bureau in Zhengzhou said the first train to Europe carried 655 tons of goods worth USD1.52 million – including tires, textiles, shoes and apparel – in 51 containers. Two-thirds of the goods are from Henan and the rest from the provinces of Zhejiang, Fujian and Jiangxi. Shi Fenghua, Assistant to the General Manager of China Railway Container Transport’s Zhengzhou branch, said local traders used to transport their goods by road to ports in Liangyungang in Jiangsu or Qingdao in Shandong and then ship them overseas before the rail line came into operation. “We expect the majority of them will turn to the railroad in future for its efficiency and convenience,” Shi said. The Bureau charges CNY15,200 to transport a single container to the Alataw Pass. Customers have to pay separately for the remainder of the journey, from Xinjiang to Hamburg. There would be 14 such trains to Germany this year. In addition to the route from Zhengzhou to Hamburg, the Bureau has opened three branch lines to Moscow, Klaipeda in Lithuania and Almaty in Kazakhstan.

China Railway Corp said it will revamp its freight transport business. Many factors have hindered the growth of CRC’s transport business, such as complicated procedures for customers in making orders, as well as problems with deliveries and a lack of standardized rates for its services, said Cheng Xiandong, Director of the Transport Bureau of CRC. The reform of its freight transport is the first substantial move since CRC was established in March. CRC plans to become more streamlined by cutting red tape for customers and enhance cooperation with its clients, which the former Ministry of Railways (MOR) failed to do. Procedures for customers will be made simpler, transport will be tailored to customers’ needs, charges will be standardized and a network for a pickup and delivery service that goes from door to door will be set up, Cheng said. CRC will transport goods that range from coal and oil to cars and chilled fresh food.

The central government plans to reform its railway freight industry to boost efficiency and drive down costs in the fragmented logistics sector. The reforms are expected to simplify railway freight procedures and provide customers with better service. The move is the first of a series of measures planned by China Railway Corp (CRC) for the next few years as it faces pressure to boost demand for railway freight services and turn itself into an efficient and profitable business following the abolition in March of the Ministry of Railways (MOR). While China continues to invest in high-speed railway networks, the railway freight business is shrinking. Ministry of Transport statistics show railway freight volume dropped 0.7% to 3.9 billion tons last year because of economic weakness and less demand for coal. The trend continued this year, with freight traffic falling 0.8% in the first quarter. “We must turn from being a bulk-goods-focused transport service provider to being a full-service logistics provider,” Sheng Guangzu, General Manager at China Railway, said last month. Railway freight services in China are notorious for their complicated application procedures, long waiting times and inefficiency. Under the reform plan, customers will be able to arrange cargo delivery through a hotline and online platforms, in addition to traditional counter services. China Railway, while guaranteeing sufficient transport capacity for bulk goods, such as coal and petroleum, also promises to offer prompt service for customers with goods such as electrical equipment and daily necessities. It also plans to make pricing more transparent. The company’s subsidiaries in provinces such as Guangdong, Hunan and Hainan are among the first to launch door-to-door services that include the collecting, loading, packing, processing and delivering of goods. Previously, clients were required to deliver and pick up their goods at train stations themselves.

On January 2, a train loaded with electronic products arrived in Lodz, a city in central Poland, after a 15 day journey from Chengdu, capital of Sichuan province. As the rail route started operating regularly in March, it has become the fastest railway freight route between China and Europe. The regular train, traveling once a week between the two cities separated by a distance of more than 10,000 kilometers, cuts the transport time from 40 to 15 days, according to Chengdu Logistics Office. Previously, products made in Chengdu had to be transported to Shenzhen or Shanghai before being shipped to European ports. The opening of the Chengdu-Lodz direct rail route is Chengdu’s latest effort to improve its infrastructure and establish itself as a major logistics hub in China. Zhang Chi, Director of the Logistics Coordination Center of the Chengdu Logistics Office, said that at present the cost of rail freight is more than two times that of shipping, which is the main reason behind its comparatively slower growth rate. But if the efficiency of rail freight is improved, and given it is faster than shipping, rail transportation will become increasingly popular. “If the train can be fully loaded in both directions, the cost will be reduced. Otherwise the cost will be very high,” said Zhang.

Though almost all of China’s railways use the standard rail gauge adopted by 60% of railways in the world, the country should consider building a broad-gauge railway to facilitate cargo transport between China and Europe, Yu Haiyan, Communist Party Secretary of Lanzhou, capital of Gansu province, said. Almost all of China’s railways use track with a gauge of 1,435 millimeters, but Russia and most of its neighboring countries use a broader track with a gauge of about 1,520 millimeters. The difference in gauge has caused trouble for rail transport on the Eurasia corridor, which starts from Lianyungang in East China and goes to Europe via Central Asia. The land corridor was supposed to shorten the time of shipping freight by rail, but because of the track gauge difference and other factors, Chinese trains have to stop at the border and freight is transferred to foreign trains for the rest of the trip west, he said. Yu, who is heading the development of an experimental economic zone in Lanzhou, suggested that railway authorities should consider building a broad-gauge railway from the border to Lanzhou, a transport hub linking East and West since ancient times. “With a broad-gauge railway, freight can be transported from Lanzhou to Amsterdam in just a week, compared with 40 days by sea from Guangzhou to Europe,” he said. Lanzhou is the ideal location to put one end of the broad-gauge rail line because “its distance from Guangzhou and other coastal areas of China is similar to its distance from the Alashankou Port”, where cargo is moved from Chinese trains to foreign ones on the border, he said. The proposed railway is part of the favorable policies that the Lanzhou New Area, China’s fifth state-level new area but the first one in the underdeveloped western part of China, is trying to get from the central government, the China Daily reports.

Chengdu has played an increasingly prominent role in cargo transport as the starting point of cargo lines to Shanghai, Guangzhou, Nanjing, Xuzhou, Ningbo, Lanzhou and Lianyungang. It is also home to one of 18 container stations. Covering more than 140 hectares, the station was put into use in early 2010. Built to have annual handling capacity of 26.26 million tons, it is said to be the largest in Asia. Logistics parks built around the station link to at least 55 cities. Improved logistics will help local businesses cut their shipping costs by some 30%, according to a local newspaper. Cargo rail links have been extended to Europe. In 2012, a freight route linking Chengdu and Duisburg in western Germany, opened to traffic. Local products can now be shipped to Germany within 16 days. Later that year, InterRail and China Railway International Multimodal Transport Co began a pilot route connecting Chengdu to Lodz, the third-largest city in Poland. Chengdu also boasts a well-developed road network with national-level expressways extending out to Shanxi and Yunnan provinces, the Tibet autonomous region and Chongqing. Thanks to Chengdu’s enhanced transport infrastructure and geographical location, some 50 modern logistics companies including UPS, DHL and Maersk had set up offices in the city by early March, the China Daily reports.