Bid to revive China-Spain train line
The first train between the two cities arrived in the Spanish capital in December 2014 after a deal between the Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping.
Since then, another 39 convoys have transported Chinese exported products. Only 8 have returned with Spanish goods.
Fast but expensive
Rail transport is faster than sea routes – taking 21 days as opposed to up to 40 by container vessel – but is also significantly more expensive. A container aboard the Yiwu Express costs €2,000, while one stored on a ship costs €1,300.
Sheng Quiping, a senior Communist Party representative from Yiwu, said in Madrid this week that he believed that despite the economic slowdown in his country, there was still demand for Spanish goods. “In the next five years we are going to promote imports. Spanish goods are very popular,” he said.
Yiwu is a huge distribution center for central China, filled with thousands of wholesalers. Mao said that if you spent eight hours a day visiting its stores, taking just three minutes in each, it would take more than a year to enter each one. The city has a GDP equivalent to 8% of Portugal’s, and it is visited by around 10 million buyers each year.
Source: Elpais