Railway staff check containers on a China-Europe freight train. [Photo/Jinan Daily]

The Qilu China-Europe freight trains have played a crucial role in stabilizing global supply and industrial chains, as well as boosting Shandong's international trade and cooperation, said local officials.

On Oct 31, 2018, the first provincial unified China-Europe freight train, named "Qilu", set off, marking the beginning of a new era of efficient operation for Shandong province's China-Europe freight train services with a unified brand, schedule, platform, policies, and promotion.

Over the past five years, the number of Qilu China-Europe freight trains operating has increased from an average of less than 200 trains per year before comprehensive planning to over 2,000 trains per year, making it one of the leading train services nationwide.

Shandong Hi-Speed Group, the operator of Qilu China-Europe freight trains, has invested in and constructed consolidation centers in Jinan and Qingdao. The Jinan Consolidation Center project is about to begin partial operation and has been selected as part of the fourth batch of national multimodal transport demonstration projects, supporting Jinan's inclusion in the first batch of national comprehensive freight hub cities. The Qingdao Consolidation Center project is scheduled to begin trial operations next year.

In the first three quarters of this year, the volume of China-Europe freight train services in Jinan, Qingdao, and Linyi accounted for about 90 percent of the total volume in the province, an increase of 38 percentage points compared to the initial phase of comprehensive planning.

The Qilu China-Europe freight train service has set up its first overseas assembly center in Almaty, Kazakhstan and four supporting overseas warehouses in Uzbekistan, Serbia, Germany and Poland, respectively.

The Qilu China-Europe freight train service now covers 56 cities in 24 countries and regions involved in the Belt and Road Initiative, contributing greatly to a multimodal transportation logistics corridor that covers Shandong and extends to the Yellow Sea, Central Asia, South Asia, and Europe, and facilitating two-way exchanges between the east and the west.