China's Pinglu Canal to link landlocked regions with Southeast Asia | All about the trade shortcut
The opening of the canal has led China to seek to deepen its ties with ASEAN countries in the wake of the rising tensions in the West Asia region.
China has inaugurated a 134-kilometer long canal, the Pinglu Canal, which will serve as a trade shortcut between its landlocked regions and Southeast Asia. At a cost of 72.7 billion yuan, the canal took four years to construct and will link Nanning in Guangxi to the Gulf of Tonkin. State broadcaster CCTV hailed it as the "project of our century".
This canal, part of President Xi Jinping's Belt and Road Initiative, is the first of its kind since the People's Republic of China's founding in 1949. The canal's opening comes as China intensifies ties with Southeast Asia, particularly in light of tensions in West Asia. The canal will reduce the journey of goods from Guangzhou to the sea by at least 560 kilometers and cut transport costs by an estimated 18 to 30 percent, saving over five billion yuan ($745 million) in the sector.
It will also benefit rural areas in Sichuan, Chongqing, and Yunnan, and improve the movement of coal, ore, cereals, chemicals, agricultural produce, and other materials to foreign markets.
Written by urgent.news from Hindustan Times - World News's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
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