China's Railways at Full Steam

China, with a land mass slightly larger than that of the United States but total railway track length only one fifth as large, is welcoming international investment. The Chinese Ministry of Railways (MR) will soon unveil new regulations encouraging foreign investors to enter the huge, attractive market in China's fast expanding railways.

In the next five years, MR will build 8,100 kilometers (5,063 miles) of new lines, upgrade existing lines and add new engines and cars. Large corporations from the United States, Germany and Denmark have already shown strong interest in its ambitious expansion program.

About 76,000 freight cars chug along China's railways every day, hauling 4 million tons of cargo from one place to another. Meanwhile, more than 1,000 pairs of passenger trains are packed with nearly 3 million people traveling across the length and breadth of this land of 3.75 million square miles.

Railways are responsible for 70% of the medium and long-distance freight transport in China. Despite a rapid expansion of the country's civil aviation and highway networks, 50% of domestic travelers are carried by trains, according to the Ministry of Railways.

In 1995, the railway system handled 1.593 billion tons of cargo and 1.02 billion passengers. By the year 2000, the annual railway freight volume will grow to 1.8 billion tons, and the annual passenger volume, to 1.25 billion persons.

The following chart compares the railway industries of China and the United States:

While the railway industry has grown steadily in China, the United States has seen its railway transportation decrease for decades. The United States has 283,099 kilometers of operated railroad track, as compared to a peak of 409,177 km in 1916. While more than 2.4 billion passengers were transported by trains in 1986 (6.5 million a day), only 22 million of them (60,000 a day) were intercity travelers and the majority were commuters between metropolitan areas and suburbs. The number of passenger cars in service declined from more than 11,000 in 1970 to fewer than 2400 in the late 1980s.

In China, over the past five years, a record RMB 108.1 billion (US$ 13 billion) has been invested in the building of 5,900 kilometers of new railways. One of them, 1,956 kilometers long linking Beijing and Hong Kong, is scheduled for full operation in 1997, when China resumes its sovereignty over the territory. Railways in China now total 60,000 km (37,500 miles) in length. Some 53% of these are single main lines (31,800 kin); 29%, double main lines (17,400 kin); and 18%, or 10,800 kilometers, electrified.

The Ministry also takes pride in a range of construction projects, most notably the multi-billion-yuan West Beijing Railway Station, the largest in Asia.

In the words of MR officials, the railway sector has had and will continue to have a "golden opportunity" since, from 1981 to 1995, the national economy grew at double-digit rates and is expected to increase at no less than 8% a year during the 1996-2000 period.

Meanwhile, the pressure for railway service is "unprecedentedly heavy." The railway system can handle 2.43 million passengers a day at most, but in 1995 it had to accommodate nearly 2.8 million. In addition, while 100,000 freight cars are needed per day, only 76,000 can be operated.

For most Chinese, this means painful experiences in getting train tickets and in dealing with overcrowded conditions, standing for hours and even days in railway cars bursting with passengers. Numerous stories are told by the press of farmers weeping over fruit or vegetables spoiling or rotting because of delayed railway transport. Moreover, in developed eastern regions, there are 21 "bottlenecks" where the traffic volume is so great that delays are frequent and lengthy. These difficulties adversely affect the entire national economy.

"To make things better, the development of the railway sector must be accelerated," said Han Subin, minister of railways. According to the minister, MR plans to build, over the next five years, 8,100 km of new railways, of which 2,700 km will be double main lines and 4,300 km will be electrified.

Priority will be given to expanding the railway's capacity to transport coal out from Shanxi, Shaanxi and western Inner Mongolia, to highly industrialized but energy hungry regions along the east coast.

Coal accounts for a large part of the railway freight volume. In 1995, 674 million tons of coal were hauled by railway, accounting for 42% of the total freight volume handled by the Chinese railway sector. Of this, over one third, or 250 million tons, was from Shanxi, Shaanxi and western Inner Mongolia, China's leading coal producers. The figure will grow to well over 300 million tons by the year 2000, according to forecasts by MR and other ministries.

Several new railways will to be build for coal transport:

• The Shuoxian-Huanghua Railway: a 599-km electrified double main line that will start in northern Shanxi province and end in Hebei province. The railway, with an annual hauling capacity of 70 million tons, is designed mainly to ship coal out of western Inner Mongolia, northern Shaanxi and northern Shanxi.
• The Handan-Jinan Railway: a 233-km single main line that will run from Handan, Hebei province, to Jinan, capital of Shandong. The railway, capable of handling 20 million tons of goods a year, will be a new route for transporting coal from central Shanxi.
• The Xinxiang-Heze Railway: a 160-km double main line that will connect Xinxiang, Henan province, to Heze, Shandong province. The railway, able to annually handle 60 million tons of cargo, will haul coal out of the southern and southeastern parts of Shanxi province.

In addition, China plans to construct a 1,149-kin double main line that runs from Xi'an, capital of Shaanxi, to Nanjing, capital of Jiangsu. The railway, to be completed in ten years, will transport coal from northern Shaanxi to eastern and central China.

Priority will also be given to the southwest provinces of Sichuan, Yunnan and Guizhou, in line with the strategic policy of shifting the focus of economic construction to underdeveloped regions in central and western China.

Rugged terrain explains the traditional poverty of the provinces, and the fact that few railways are in operation there. According to MR statistics, railways were able to meet only 40% of the local demand for freight transport in 1994.

To facilitate the development of these and other poor regions, a number of new railways will be built over the next five years:

• The Xi'an-Ankang Railway: a 244-km double main line from Xi'an, capital of Shaanxi province, to Ankang in southern Shaanxi which borders Sichuan to the south.
• The Liupanshui-Zhuzhou Railway: a 950-km double main line from Liupanshui bordering on Yunnan and Guizhou to Zhuzhou in Hunan province of central south China.

Currently, MR is completing an 898-kilometer railway that runs from Kunming, capital of Yunnan province, to Nanning, capital of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. Also to be completed is the electrification of the 1,100-km railway that links Chengdu, capital of Sichuan, and Kunming, capital of Yunnan.

In the meantime, the country will continue to pour resources into the Beijing-Kowloon Railway, known as China's fourth north-to-south railway "artery", to ensure that it goes into full operation as scheduled. The Beijing-Kowloon railway is expected to eventually handle 70 million tons of freight a year.

One of the major projects associated with the Beijing-Kowloon Railway is a railway bridge across the Yangtze River near the city of Wuhu in Anhui province, which will cost RMB 2.5 billion (US$ 301 million) to build.

Also being planned is a railway project to link the HainanIsland with the Mainland, which are separated by the QiongzhouStrait. The project calls for a 135-km railway from Zhanjiang to Hai'an which faces Haikou across the QiongzhouStrait. Trains will then be ferried across the sea from Haikou and Hai'an respectively.

MR officials have yet to decide whether the ferries will be built in China, bought from abroad, or leased. "We'll use whatever is most cost-effective and safe, anyway," one official remarked.

For the Northern China region, the ministry plans to build a 423-km passenger-only line between Shenyang, capital of Liaoning province, and Qinhuangdao, a port city in Hebei. Another major project is the electrification of the 946-kilometer line from Harbin, capital of Heilongjiang, to Dalian, a port city in Liaoning.

In northwest China, a 974-km railway will be built to link Kuerle in central Xinjiang and Kashi on the western tip of the region. It will facilitate the oil operations in the TarimBasin, a promising oil and gas base for the next century.

The double-lining of the Lanzhou-Xinjiang Railway will be completed over the next five years. From Lanzhou, capital of Gansu province, to Urumqi, capital of Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, this is the only railway linking Xinjiang with other parts of China.

At the March session of the National People's Congress, China's parliament, delegates proposed that a railway be built to link Tibet with the rest of the country. MR officials say that the ministry takes the proposal "seriously." Two alternatives are being considered for the railway: reaching Tibet from the East or from the North.

By building new railways, MR strives to increase the number of passenger trains dispatched per day, from 1,088 pairs in 1994 to 1,250 in 2000. The number of through passenger trains will increase from t97 pairs per day to 337.

Passenger trains on busy lines are expected to increase their speed to an average of I00 km per hour, up from less than 50 km now. A 298-km section of the Beijing-Shanghai Railway is being upgraded so that it will be suitable for trains running at 250-300 km per hour. As regards passenger comfort, MR plans to increase the number of air-conditioned passenger cars in use to 18,000 by the year 2000.

MR will need an estimated RMB 420 billion (US$ 50.6 billion) to implement all these projects. The figure includes about RMB 80 billion (US$ 964 million) for purchasing new trains and RMB 90 billion (US$ 10.8 billion) for technological renovation, MR officials say.

Most of the funds will be provided by the central government with the rest to be raised either from banks or by issuing railway construction bonds and attracting foreign investment.

To date, the railway sector has reportedly attracted US$ 2.47 billion in pledged foreign funds. MR officials disclosed that the ministry and the Zhejiang Provincial Government are working with a Taiwan company registered in Hong Kong on the construction of a 251-km single main line in Zhejiang, the very first joint venture railway in China. The railway involves an investment estimated at RMB 2 billion (US$ 240 million).

To encourage foreign investment, the Chinese government is formulating a set of policies for the management of Sino-foreign joint venture railways, which will be published soon.