China-Europe Relations: Freight train service helps unleash trading potential

World
Europe

03:13

China and the European Union both wield great economic power – and trade is big business. As CGTN's Meng Qingsheng reports, their robust trade relations are being boosted by freight train service.

In southwest China's Chengdu, television manufacturer Skyworth delivers its first batch of products onboard the China-Europe Railway Express. The freight train, heading for Lodz in Poland, carries 41 cabinets loaded with TV displays, motherboards and other spare parts.

WANG ZHIGUO, PRESIDENT SHENZHEN SKYWORTH-RGB "The China-Europe Railway Express helps connect the manufacturing and distribution ends of our products. We hope to improve supply chains and production strategies and integrate into the European market. And we are planning to bring an automated production line to the continent, and better supply markets there."

The railway network connects 59 cities in China with 15 European countries. Chengdu is one of the busiest. In 2018, the city dispatched over 15 hundred freight trains to Europe, a quarter of the country's total.

MENG QINGSHENG CHENGDU "Departing from here, it takes roughly two weeks for cargo trains to travel the 10 thousand kilometer distance between China and Europe. It's about a month faster than traveling by sea, while costing relatively the same. Since it was launched in 2013, this logistical solution has helped open up China's hinterland and contribute to a boom in bilateral trade relations."

Official statistics show two-way trade between China and the EU hit a record high of over 680 billion US dollars in 2018, up more than 10 percent year-on-year.

European enterprises are embracing the Chinese market by expanding their businesses.

KATARZYNA WILKOWIECKA CONSUL GENERAL OF POLAND IN CHENGDU "In many cases, our food production is more ecological, so that we use less fertilizers than our Western neighbors. Our products are innovative. Of my opinion, China has already experienced good trade with Europe. But we would like to have it both ways."

Hailing its maiden freight train transport, Skyworth plans to export 1.5 million TV sets this way to Europe in 2019. It sees a total market potential of eight million across the continent.

WANG ZHIGUO, PRESIDENT SHENZHEN SKYWORTH-RGB "We need to focus on the content of our service, as well as ways to meet the European standards. We hope to include more services into our smart TV designs in Europe."

To that end, the company has decided to set up supply chain centers in countries like Poland and Germany while these trains carrying its TV products take the company a step closer to fulfilling its global strategy.

Meng Qingsheng, CGTN, Chengdu, Sichuan Province.