Century-old port's new changes

(chinadaily.com.cn)

Updated: 2014-07-11

Upgrade reloading capacity

There’s an international railway port in Manzhouli that’s the biggest of its kind with the biggest customs clearance capacity. It opened in 1901.

The port has a reloading site that carries an annual reloading capacity of 30 million tons. The site usually is filled with Chinese and Russian freight trains. A mechanical arm from a huge gantry crane picked coals from a Russian train on May 27 and put them on Chinese trains. Goods from Russia have to be reloaded here before being sent to Manzhouli because of differences in rail width between the two countries.

The railway port witnessed a significant increase in the number of empty containers sent to China in the first quarter of 2014. A total of 390 empty containers were handled by the local inspection and quarantine bureau, up 82.24 percent year-on-year, which means big growth in goods volume.

Manzhouli began to build a new international freight yard in 2008, according to an employee with the Manzhouli land port office. The yard covers an area of 15 square kilometers and involved an investment of 3.3 billion yuan in the first phase. It was jointly funded by the Ministry of Railways, the China Railway Container Transport, and other well-known foreign companies. The yard has a railway logistics center, bulk coal, auto, ore and dangerous chemical yards, as well as a container station. It will help achieve more rational resource allocation at the railway port and have an annual reloading capacity of 70 million tons when put into operation.

New Silk Road

A train filled with cargo started off in Jiangsu’s Suzhou on Sept 30, 2013, and traveled 11,200 kilometers to Poland’s Warsaw through Manzhouli railway port and Russia. The train spans Eurasia and acts as a new channel for export to Europe and Russia. It was named the Suzhou-Manzhouli-Europe New Silk Road train.

Manzhouli customs signed a cooperation deal with Suzhou customs to establish a work communication mechanism, while the Russia-controlled Far East Land Bridge Co formed a joint venture with the SND Integrated Free Trade Zone and Suzhou Xiangying International Logistics Co to be in charge of train operations, laying a solid foundation for train operations.

A delegation from Manzhouli visited Russia on April 17, 2014, and signed a protocol with Russia’s Siberia management bureau, which ensured that the freight train will enjoy the same time limit for customs clearance in Russia and Europe. In addition, a green channel was established for the Suzhou-Manzhouli-Europe train. The train has set eight records. It’s the only train that spans Eurasia, the only two-way import-export train, the only train to Europe from Manzhouli land port, the only train operated by the Russian Far East Land Bridge, the only train to receive attention from the Russian railway minister, the only train that can be stopped at Moscow, the train that passes the fewest countries, and the only train that’s operated by the market.