BEIJING — China is investing more than 800 billion yuan ($128 billion) in domestic railway construction in 2015, the same as last year’s final target, while pledging to increase its railway makers’ overseas market share.
In his annual state-of-the-nation report Thursday, Chinese Premier Li Keqiang included rail-equipment makers as one of seven sectors the government will prioritize for export. In addition to pushing for high-profile overseas contracts, some 8,000 kilometres of railway lines will be opened to domestic traffic this year, Mr Li said.
"We will encourage Chinese companies to participate in overseas infrastructure-development projects and engage in cooperation with their foreign counterparts in building up production capacity," Mr Li said.
Passengers wait for a train at a platform of a train station during a rush hour on the first working day after Chinese Lunar New Year holiday in Beijing. (Reuters photo)
Thailand signed an agreement with China last year to build a 734-kilometre-long Nong Khai-Nakhon Ratchasima-Kaeng Khoi-Map Ta Phut railway line and a 133km track from Kaeng Khoi to Bangkok. The unofficial cost is estimated at 350-400 billion baht.
China Railway Corporation will set up a consortium to operate the projects. The consortium will comprise manufacturers of construction materials and train control systems. China will oversee the rail and signal systems and construction of tunnels through mountains.
China also is competing aggressively for overseas rail projects in Africa, Eastern Europe, Latin America and elsewhere in Southeast Asia. Meanwhile, it is pitching high-profile contracts in the developed world, including the US.
China's two largest locomotive equipment makers, China CNR Corp and CSR Corp, have announced a merger plan intended to boost exports of high-speed rail technology.
Rail-transit equipment was also cited in a separate report Thursday from the National Development and Reform Commission, the country's top economic planning agency, as a key area of its "Made in China 2025" strategy to transform manufacturing industries and help China move up the technological value chain.
With Mr Li touting the country's rail engineering and construction companies on trips abroad, Chinese companies signed a combined $24.7 billion worth of contracts for overseas rail projects in 2014, Commerce Ministry official Zhi Luxun said at a Feb 5 briefing in Beijing.
China CNR Corp and CSR Corp together signed more than $6 billion of overseas contracts last year, up 60% from 2013, Mr Zhi said.
An employee works on a final assembly line for CRH380B, a high speed train model, at China CNR's Tangshan Railway Vehicle's factory in Tangshan, Hebei province. China CNR Corp and CSR Corp together signed more than $6 billion of overseas contracts last year, up 60% from 2013. (Reuters photo)
"One belt, one road"
In its report, the National Development and Reform Commission said it will speed up "infrastructure connectivity" with neighbouring countries, building "economic corridors" with Myanmar, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and India as part of China's Silk Road Economic Belt and 21st Century Maritime Silk Road initiatives.
China's "one belt, one road" strategy is an attempt to build a new framework for regional development, National People's Congress spokeswoman Fu Ying said at a press briefing Wednesday. China set up a $16.3 billion Silk Road Fund last November to finance infrastructure construction linking its markets to three continents.
China's outbound direct investment reached $102.9 billion in 2014, a figure the government hopes to raise this year to $113 billion, the NDRC said today.
Mr Li also pledged to deepen reform of railway investment and financing through "good use" of railway development funds. Major domestic railway, highway and waterway transport projects will be weighted toward central and western parts of the country, he said.
In China, 8,427 kilometres of railway tracks became operational in 2014, Mr Li said. The length of high-speed railway lines in operation in China reached 16,000 kilometres last year, more than 60% of the world's total, he said.