Crew members of a passenger train bound for the Lao capital Vientiane prepare for departure from Kunming South Railway Station in Kunming, southwest China's Yunnan Province, April 13, 2023. Photo: Xinhua

The number of meter-gauge railway between Kaiyuan, Southwest China's Yunnan Province to Haiphong of Vietnam has reached 4,025, transferring 1.6 million tons of cross-border goods, boosting the logistics transportation between China and other countries in Southeast Asia.

A meter-gauge railway is a railway with a gauge of one meter. Relying on the meter-gauge railway to Vietnam, the freight trains run in two directions from Kaiyuan and Haiphong.

The meter-gauge China-ASEAN freight trains started operation in December 2017. Following the recovery of global economy, the railway has witnessed a stable operation with two to four trains running each day. 

At present, the export of China-ASEAN freight trains is limited to chemical fertilizers, while imports are focused on sulfur, according to Dong Wujun from Kunming branch of China Railway, reported CCTV.com on Tuesday. 

The report said that the meter-gauge China-ASEAN freight trains has accounted for 40 percent of the total volume of China-Vietnam meter-gauge international intermodal transport, and the proportion of imported and exported goods has remained basically the same.

Market insiders said that the volume of import and export of goods has increased year by year, with the development of trade through railway transportation and sea-rail combined transportation, opening up expanding trade partners from Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia to Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and other Middle Eastern countries.

In Yunnan, international freight trains on the China-Laos Railway depart from Kunming in Yunnan Province, and go straight to Vientiane in Laos. The meter-gauge China-ASEAN freight trains start from Kaiyuan in Yunnan Province and goes straight to Haiphong in Vietnam. With the Kunming railway hub as the center, the two international logistics channels are integrated into the regional railway network.

The China-Laos Railway, which began cross-border passenger services in April this year, has transported 41,735 passengers from across 49 countries and regions as of July 22, when it marked its 100th day of operation, reported the Xinhua News Agency. 

Among the total, the number of inbound passengers was 12.2 percent higher than outbound passenger numbers, reaching 22,066, 54 percent of which were tourists.

Currently, the travel time via the China-Laos Railway has been shortened by more than an hour. Previously, a trip from Kunming to the Lao capital of Vientiane on the 1,035-km-long track took 10 and half hours to complete, including the time spent on clearing customs.

Global Times