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Huizhao Huang

Beijing has pledged to upgrade the China-Europe Railway Express and stepped up development of a southern rail route that bypasses Russia, as the railway network struggles to keep pace with surging demand for Chinese exports such as electric vehicles and air conditioners.
The General Administration of Customs would support the construction of assembly centres and hub cities for the China-Europe Railway Express to keep cross-border logistics channels “diverse and unimpeded”, customs spokesman Lu Daliang said on Wednesday.
The pledge came days after a fresh Chinese investment in the network’s southern branch.
On July 16, during Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev’s visit to Shanghai, China’s Guoyou Materials Group signed an agreement to build the first phase of a multifunctional terminal at Kuryk, a Kazakh port on the Caspian Sea that forms part of the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route, better known as the Middle Corridor.
Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the main artery of the China-Europe Railway Express, which runs through Russian territory, has been shunned by many European traders, bringing the trans-Caspian route to the fore as an alternative.
This summer, the railway has become one of the main channels rushing Chinese air conditioners to heat-stricken Europe. But the surge also exposed the network’s limits, with cargo backing up at Malaszewicze, the Polish border hub through which most trains pass, underscoring the need for more resilient and better-connected routes.
The Kuryk project aims to bring the port’s capacity to 15 million tonnes, Kazakhstan’s state news agency Kazinform reported, citing the presidential press service – more than three times the Middle Corridor’s current annual traffic of just over 4.5 million tonnes according to Kazakhstan’s transport ministry.
Its first phase is expected to cost about US$300 million, with total investment potentially reaching US$1.1 billion, Kazinform reported. Operations are scheduled to begin in 2028 and are expected to create around 800 permanent jobs.




The trans-Caspian route moved about 77,000 standard containers last year, according to Kazakh figures, less than 4 per cent of the 2.05 million that China State Railway Group said were carried on the China-Europe Railway Express.
Industry insiders said new port capacity alone could not fix the main issue holding the Middle Corridor back.
“The investment addresses infrastructure, but the real bottleneck is the imbalance between outbound and return cargo,” said Jet Young, general manager of Eurasia International Freight Forwarding (Shanghai).
Young said Kuryk’s rail-ferry terminal allowed entire trains to roll onto ferries and cross the Caspian, but a lack of return cargo meant Kazakhstan’s railway was reluctant to let its wagons leave the country. Most containers still moved via the older port of Aktau, where they were lifted off the wagons and shipped before being reloaded in Baku, leaving much of Kuryk’s potential untapped.
Shipments to Germany via the corridor typically took more than 60 days, he said.
Europe is betting on the same corridor. In September, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the European Union announced up to €45 million (US$51 million) in loans and grants to double container capacity at Aktau, under the bloc’s Global Gateway initiative.
Beijing has cast the buildout as a joint effort with countries along the route. China would “deepen port and customs cooperation with neighbouring countries” and build cross-border transport corridors through “consultation, joint contribution and shared benefits”, Lu said.


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Agreement to build first phase of a multifunctional terminal at Kuryk, a Kazakh port on the Caspian Sea, signed in Shanghai recently


Agreement to build first phase of a multifunctional terminal at Kuryk, a Kazakh port on the Caspian Sea, signed in Shanghai recently.


Beijing to upgrade China-Europe Railway Express freight network and southern alternative

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Agreement to build first phase of a multifunctional terminal at Kuryk, a Kazakh port on the Caspian Sea, signed in Shanghai recently

Agreement to build first phase of a multifunctional terminal at Kuryk, a Kazakh port on the Caspian Sea, signed in Shanghai recently