In April, freight of 267 million tons was transported on national railways, up 540,000 tons (0.2%) over the same period of last year, with a daily loading of 146,000 wagons, maintained at a high level since March. From January to April this year, freight of 1.09 billion tons was transported on national railways accumulatively, up 2.4% over the same period of last year, providing a reliable transportation support for the prevention and control of COVID-19 and the accelerated restoration of economic and social development order.
According to an official of freight department of CHINA RAILWAY, in April, the railway sector has achieved outstanding performance in distribution of ore from major coastal ports and traffic volume of CRE trains. For distribution of ore from ports, the railway sector has innovated the distribution mode at ports to actively meet the market demand and formulate the transportation plan in the concept of "one policy for one enterprise". It has sped up the construction of railway special lines for factories, mines and port enterprises, and provided "railway open top container + short distance truck" transport service for the enterprise users without railway special lines, so as to serve the "last mile" in transportation. It has allocated special staff to speed up the loading and unloading organization at ports, improved vehicle organization and transportation efficiency, and actively undertaken the cargoes shifted from highway to railway. In April, 31.89 million tons of ore were distributed from major coastal ports, up 17.7% year-on-year, of which 5.03 million tons were distributed from Rizhao Port, up 750,000 tons (17%) year-on-year, 4.05 million tons were distributed from Tianjin Port, up 1.46 million tons (57%) year-on-year, and 3.62 million tons were distributed from Lianyungang, up 690,000 tons (24%) year-on-year. For CRE train transport, the railway sector dispatched a working group to strengthen on-site guidance and ensure the safe and smooth traffic at each port station. It has innovated handover methods to implement paperless customs clearance at some ports, strengthened communication with railway authorities of the countries along the route to ensure the normal and stable operation of CRE trains, and made positive contributions to smoothing the foreign trade logistics supply chain and strengthening international cooperation on epidemic prevention. In April, CRE trains carried 88,000 TEUs of cargoes in total, up 50% year-on-year, including 53,000 TEUs in departure trip (up 68% year-on-year) and 35,000 TEUs in return trip (up 29% year on year). These trains carried 369,000 pieces (2,972 tons) of anti-epidemic supplies for international cooperation.
The official said that since the beginning of this year, resolutely implementing the decisions and deployments made by the CPC Central Committee and the State Council on the full implementation of "stability of employment, finance, foreign trade, foreign investment, investment and expectation" and "guarantees of people's employment, basic livelihood, market entities, food and energy security, industrial and supply chain stability, and community-level operations", CHINA RAILWAY has coordinated on and promoted the epidemic prevention and the transportation production. It has ensured the safe and smooth operation of railways, strengthened freight transportation organization, optimized the supply of freight products, implemented the policy of reducing taxes and fees, and smoothed the logistics supply chain. As a result, the freight delivery on national railways has increased steadily.
