The Silk Road stretches in all directions (as shown in the picture)

The picture shows customs officers at Manzhouli Station inspecting container cargo on the China Europe freight train. Photo by Chen Liu

According to statistics, from January to November this year, there were 4377 China Europe freight trains entering and exiting through Manzhouli Port, carrying 457000 TEUs, an increase of 8.4% and 6.2% year-on-year, respectively. Among them, there are 2705 return trains carrying 191000 TEUs.

In order to ensure the speed and efficiency of the China Europe freight train, Manzhouli Customs regularly reviews the suggestions and demands of freight forwarders and import and export enterprises. Through the "Customs Director Contact Key Enterprises" mechanism, special lectures, and other methods, it deeply interprets the measures that benefit enterprises, such as the deduction of freight charges for the return domestic section of the China Europe freight train, and provides "one-on-one" guidance for enterprise compliance declaration. In the first 11 months, we helped companies reduce return shipping costs by 15.33 million yuan and waived taxes by 1.8745 million yuan. At the same time, a dedicated customs clearance window for China Europe freight trains will be established, with priority given to reviewing and releasing cargo manifest data for China Europe freight trains. The "Railway Express" business model will be actively promoted, and the overall operating time of freight trains will be shortened by 1-2 days. In addition, taking the construction of "dual intelligence" as the starting point, applying the "three mechanisms" of information sharing, emergency response, and comprehensive analysis and reporting, a railway port logistics intelligent supervision platform will be built to comprehensively and full-time monitor port station inventory and logistics dynamics, classify and set disposal measures and processes, and ensure smooth customs clearance of trains.

We have established a collaborative mechanism between 'customs, railway, and enterprises' to dynamically grasp the operation plan of trains. Based on different operating routes and commodity structures of trains, we scientifically allocate customs clearance resources, tailor supervision plans, and combine convenient measures such as 7 × 24-hour appointment customs clearance to reduce unnecessary stay time and ensure efficient customs clearance of trains. "said Mi Junming, Deputy Director of Manzhouli Station Customs under Manzhouli Customs.