A rail route was established in 2012 along the route of the ancient Silk Road, to smooth the flow of trade and transportation between multiple neighboring countries. But many problems had to be ironed out before the railway could function well. Now, to usher in the fifth anniversary of China's Belt and Road Initiative, the country's State Post Bureau has launched a mail delivery service on the route. Our correspondent Natalie Carney has more.

NATALIE CARNEY FRANKFURT "The Yu'Xin'Ou Railway is an impressive rail route linking the industrial hub of Chongqing, a city in China's southwest with Duisburg in central Germany.

This route is usually used to transport commercial goods from multinational IT companies, such as technological giant Foxconn who supply electronic products for Hewlett-Packard, Acer and Apple, but to celebrate the 5-year anniversary of China's Belt and Road Initiative, China's State Post Bureau has kicked off its mail delivering services using this rail route.

Yet connecting more than 11 thousand kilometers of track traveling through China, Kazakhstan, Russia, Belarus, Poland, and Germany, has been a challenging feat says Deutsche posts Senior Vice President for International mail."

THOMAS BALDRY SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT FOR INT'L MAIL & INT'L RELATIONS "The technical problems is that the rail tracks are not the same in each country so the train has to stop and a new train has to be established and the containers have to be reloaded –one problem. The other one is that there are different legal rules if you want to cross a country by train that you have to fulfill. Third problem is, of course, the language. Not everybody is able to speak English fluently and the fourth one is the customs procedures."

NATALIE CARNEY FRANKFURT "Since 2014, the EU has been China's biggest trading partner, therefore, overcoming these challenges has been paramount. In doing so this ambitious route cuts down shipment times by more than half."

THOMAS BALDRY SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT FOR INT'L MAIL & INT'L RELATIONS "The mail we receive from China, typically comes by flight, so its an air connection, which means it is comparably fast, but it is very very expensive and very unreliable so we were looking for an alternative for that. We could use the sea transportation, but the sea transportation takes very very long. We are talking about 6-8 weeks, which for our customers is not acceptable. So the third alternative is the train. If it will be up and running, it is probably something between 15-16 days."

NATALIE CARNEY FRANKFURT "When the route was first established in 2012, a roughly 700 meters long train ran weekly. Today, due to the massive increase in volume, it runs daily, improving the global flow of goods along the ancient Silk Road."

THOMAS BALDRY SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT FOR INT'L MAIL & INT'L RELATIONS "The Chinese belt and road initiative is a win-win for both Europe and China and maybe for the countries in between because it's a connection that hasn't been there before. It's a new connection, it will take away the pressure we have on air transportation and it gives employment to the people along this new belt because you need people working on the trains, working in customs and doing the interconnectivity to the other logistics. So I think it's a two win-win. And on top of that, it saves a lot of carbon dioxide emissions, which we have typically when we use air transportation probably by the factor of ten."

NATALIE CARNEY FRANKFURT "Next time you receive a letter from a friend abroad or buy your latest electronic device, it very well may have reached you by the Yu'Xin'Ou railway. Natalie Carney, CGTN, Frankfurt."