The 'Steel Silk Road' accelerates the first China Europe freight train e-commerce express line in Guangzhou, marking the first anniversary of its opening
On June 18th, a China Europe freight train loaded with cross-border e-commerce goods such as household items, creative kitchenware, and branded lighting departed from Zengcheng West Station, the eastern hub of Guangzhou's public rail intermodal transportation, sounding its horn and heading towards Europe. On this day, the first China Europe freight train e-commerce express in Guangzhou celebrated its one-year anniversary of opening. Since its launch on June 18, 2025, the e-commerce express has released a total of 9872 TEUs of goods for e-commerce trains in the past year.
Within a year, e-commerce trains started from scratch and gradually increased to an average of 4 trains per week, achieving normalized and large-scale operations. Especially from January to May this year, Zengcheng West Station has shipped over 9200 TEUs of e-commerce freight trains, accounting for nearly half of the international freight train containers shipped at Zengcheng West Station during the same period.
In order to make the e-commerce express run faster and more steadily, Zengcheng Customs has implemented appointment clearance to ensure that e-commerce containers are inspected and released as soon as they arrive and pass the inspection. The joint railway department has implemented the "two inspections in one" collaborative inspection, implementing a "one-time unpacking and synchronous operation" for goods that simultaneously hit customs inspection and railway security inspection instructions. The single box inspection time has been shortened by 3 hours, and logistics costs have been saved by about 500 yuan per box.
When we first opened this line last year, we only shipped a few containers per week. Now, it's normal to ship hundreds of containers per week, "said Zhang Junmei, the customs officer of Shenzhen Jiuzhou International Logistics Co., Ltd.
Not only is the volume of goods increasing, but the categories of goods transportation are also becoming increasingly diverse. Riding on the rise of social e-commerce and live streaming sales, many products that have become "bestsellers" in live streaming rooms have also begun to take the e-commerce express to go global, and e-commerce train orders have shown a new characteristic of "bestseller driven, small order quick response". For example, popular live streaming products such as portable solar lights need to seize the opportunity to quickly deliver to the target market. E-commerce trains have a speed advantage compared to sea freight, which is perfectly suitable for this' small order fast response 'mode, "said Zhang Junmei.
Relying on characteristic businesses such as the "China Europe Express E-commerce Express", the Guangzhou East Rail Intermodal Hub has established a logistics network covering 34 cities in 17 countries including Europe, Central Asia, and ASEAN, becoming an efficient channel for manufacturing to go global in the Greater Bay Area. With the continuous deepening of the "China Europe freight train+cross-border e-commerce" model, this "Steel Silk Road" will further expand and improve its quality, accelerate its running, and help cross-border e-commerce enterprises in the Guangdong Hong Kong Macao Greater Bay Area accelerate their "buying the world" and "selling the world". (Pu Xuan/Text)