China News Service, Qinzhou, May 11 (Title): Guangxi Qinzhou Rail-Sea Intermodal Hub Transforms, Activating the “Spring Water” of the Ocean Economy
Author: Zhai Liqiang
Stepping into the Guangxi Qinzhou Port area, a bustling scene greets the eye. Gantry cranes on the dock stretch out their giant arms, precisely hoisting containers; between the yards, container transport vehicles shuttle in an orderly manner; within the adjacent China Railway United Container Qinzhou Center Station, shunting personnel at Qinzhou Port East Station guide the locomotive for coupling operations. After the train formation is completed, a Western Land-Sea Corridor rail-sea intermodal train loaded with goods sounds its whistle and departs, speeding into the distance.
As a landmark project for the rail-sea intermodal construction of the New Western Land-Sea Corridor, the China Railway United Container Qinzhou Center Station and the Beibu Gulf Port Qinzhou Automated Container Terminal are seamlessly connected. Leveraging the “zero-distance” connection advantage with the port, the China Railway United Container Qinzhou Center Station has operated a cumulative total of 9,015 rail-sea intermodal trains in 2025, with the train network covering 18 provinces, 74 cities, and 160 stations across China. The station has innovatively launched special services such as “railway cage cars + sea-going ro-ro ships” and successfully operated cross-border trains to Almaty, building a convenient bridge for domestic and foreign trade exchanges.
“We are the key hub for the trains, and the core is to make container transshipment more efficient,” introduced Li Jinjin, Operations Department Supervisor of the China Railway United Container Qinzhou Center Station. The station, by innovatively implementing the “direct loading and direct unloading” model, achieves a seamless connection between ships and railways, directly reducing at least one round of transshipment and handling for customers, lowering logistics costs by 10 /ton.
The China Railway United Container Qinzhou Center Station consists of the Qinzhou Port East Station operation area and the port operation area. These two operation areas are connected to 4 and 2 railway freight lines respectively at Qinzhou Port East Station.
“Previously, we handled less than 10 cars a day; now we handle over 1,000 cars daily,” said Zhao Guihu, Stationmaster of Qinzhou Port East Station. As the first railway station for the rail-sea intermodal transport of the New Western Land-Sea Corridor, Qinzhou Port East Station, after ten years of development, has transformed from a small coastal freight station into an international hub station. Currently, the daily arrival and departure of rail-sea intermodal trains can reach up to 35, with the highest single-day operation count reaching 1,405 cars. Behind this efficient operation lies the continuous improvement of the corridor’s capacity.
Looking back at the development history of Qinzhou Port East Station, it has undergone continuous transformation and leapfrog growth. Qinzhou Port East Station officially opened for operation in 2015. At that time, it was merely a supporting freight station for the Qinzhou Bonded Port Area, with limited scale and influence, mainly undertaking basic freight support tasks. With the acceleration of the New Western Land-Sea Corridor construction, this small coastal station was upgraded from a Class 4 station to a Class 1 station, becoming a key node for rail-sea intermodal transport, connecting international land-sea trade, and achieving a qualitative leap and quantitative breakthrough in cargo volume.
According to official statistics, in 2025, Qinzhou Port East Station transported nearly 15 million tons of cargo, over 110 times the volume at its opening, helping the New Western Land-Sea Corridor trains transport a cumulative total of 1.425 million TEUs of cargo annually, a year-on-year increase of 47.6%.
Zhao Guihu stated that China Railway Nanning Bureau Group continues to optimize operational services, promote the “negative list” management model for containers, expand the product names for train transport to over 11,000, basically achieving full coverage of containerizable cargo sources. In the future, Qinzhou Port East Station will further enhance transport capacity guarantee and operational efficiency, deepen the integrated operation model of railway, port, and customs, strengthen the organic connection and coordination with the Pinglu Canal, and build an efficient, convenient, green, and intelligent international cargo hub station.
The transformation of Qinzhou Port East Station is a vivid footnote to the high-quality development of Guangxi Qinzhou’s ocean economy. It is understood that since the “14th Five-Year Plan” period, Qinzhou has continuously improved corridor construction, adding 20 berths of 10,000-ton class or above, bringing the total to 55. It has completed a batch of major port and shipping facilities, including a 300,000-ton oil terminal and waterway, and an automated container terminal. Qinzhou Port’s cargo throughput has exceeded 200 million tons, with an average annual growth of 10.3%, and container throughput has exceeded 7 million TEUs, with an average annual growth of 13.9%.
A thriving corridor leads to thriving industries. The continuously enhanced corridor competitiveness has activated the “spring water” of regional opening-up and development, attracting more and more enterprises to take root in Qinzhou and expand into domestic and international markets. Today, Qinzhou has gathered a number of petrochemical production enterprises such as PetroChina and Shanghai Huayi, successfully building a diversified industrial system of “oil, coal, gas, and salt”; new energy materials, equipment manufacturing and other industries are accelerating their rise, constructing a cross-border full industry chain of “laterite nickel ore – low-grade nickel matte – high-grade nickel matte – nickel sulfate – high-nickel NCM precursor”; the complete offshore wind power equipment industry chain has been established; the China-ASEAN bird’s nest cross-border industry chain has also taken shape.
Data from Qinzhou Port Customs shows that during the “14th Five-Year Plan” period, the total import and export value through Qinzhou Port exceeded 240 billion yuan. In the first quarter of this year, the total import and export value of Qinzhou Port reached 70.48 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 50.5%. (End)
